[Fic] Easy Listening - 1/1
Title: Easy Listening
Pairing: Kris/Chanyeol, Yixing/Baekhyun
Rating: PG-13
Genre: AU
Summary: When Yixing brought along a friend to watch him play, staying for the band that played after might have been the best decision of all.
***
It took three performances before Baekhyun got to meet the guy who had started coming in with his guitar and an earnest smile. What he didn’t realize that meeting him was going to be because of his seemingly earnest-smiling best friend.
“A round for me and my friend here,” Chanyeol said, smacking his hand on the bar surface and making the other patrons jerk.
Chanyeol’s life was a movie. As long as he didn’t shatter the glasses, or simulating shooting up the doors, it was good.
“Anything you wish, Master Park. And what’ll your friend have?” Baekhyun asked, smiling.
“Yixing. And…I like anything. Whatever Chanyeol likes?” Yixing said.
Straight up beer, then. Every so often he’d let Baekhyun mix him a drink. For some reason he thought Chanyeol thought it was beneath him.
“Wasn’t he amazing on stage?”
As Baekhyun slid the glasses over - beer for Yixing and Chanyeol’s typical pre-performance water - Baekhyun realized Chanyeol was doing his “I like you, but I’m smiling at you like a creep” impression at poor Yixing.
“Yeah, amazing,” Baekhyun said. “Go get your guitar ready.”
“It is. It is! I hope you come back next week,” Chanyeol told Yixing just before finishing his water and disappearing backstage.
When Yixing smiled at Baekhyun, a dimple appeared, stamping all his rational thoughts into so much dust.
“He’s a-“ Baekhyun said, waving ineffectually to where Chanyeol had gone.
“I can’t wait to hear him. He made me promise I’d stay. I think he has my guitar hostage. So I could enjoy it?”
Baekhyun laughed. That sounded exactly right. Yixing had been the easy listening part of the night’s entertainment, heartfelt lyrics and strumming guitar that fostered some conversation and rapt attention. When there hadn’t been any customers calling on him, he’d leaned back and watched the way Yixing’s eyes closed, the way he held his guitar. He didn’t know where Yixing had been found, but he’d found a place there. Two weeks, and he hadn’t even so much as been able to give Yixing a thumbs up. And then he was at his bar.
“Oh, my friend Kris,” Yixing said, and a tall man parted the crowd to get to him. “He came with me to watch.”
“Was it good?” Yixing asked, and Baekhyun tried to look busy like he wasn’t eavesdropping. He watched Chanyeol stomp onto the stage, with Kyungsoo settling at the keyboard and Jongdae at another mic.
“Very good,” Kris said, just as Chanyeol said, “I hope everyone’s having a great night tonight.”
It was Chanyeol’s voice, deep and a bit breathy from nerves, and Kris swiveled to look. Kris. Tight smile when he’d come up to the bar.
Between Chanyeol’s guitar, the keyboard, and Kyungsoo’s opening note, the whole of the room’s attention was on the stage. Chanyeol stepped up to the mic, his hair just a shade long and flopping, and started to sing.
“Close your mouth,” Baekhyun heard, and looked to see it was Yixing speaking to Kris. Yixing smiled at Baekhyun. “We’ll go listen.”
He regretted Yixing sliding off the bar stool, but two other customers sidled up to take their place, and he smiled, putting out napkins and asking what they wanted. It kept him busy until after Chanyeol’s set, the room progressively getting quieter as people trickled out. The bar was officially closed, and he set to cleaning and getting ready for the next night. When he left that night, it was with Chanyeol who was both sleepy and buzzing full of energy.
It was another week before Yixing showed up again, making Baekhyun forget his customers as he sang. It didn’t even take Chanyeol to drag Yixing to the bar, dimpling as he gave his order.
“Something with fruit?” Yixing asked.
Baekhyun ran through a few options in his head before settling on one. “You here alone tonight?”
“No. Kris was more eager to come this week. I think he enjoyed what came after me more, though.”
Baekhyun barely kept his eyebrows from raising. “Oh. Yeah, those three have been terrorizing each other and writing music for ages. I probably did some of that, too.”
He had to abandon Yixing to look after customers. But when Yixing stayed at the bar the first two songs before going to find Kris, Baekhyun felt…pleased. He thought that was the word.
When the stage went dark, Baekhyun was already cleaning and Chanyeol draped himself dramatically over the polished wood.
“Well?”
Baekhyun rolled his eyes at the obvious fish for a compliment. But that didn’t mean he was going to keep secrets.
“Hey, I think Yixing-“
“Oh, right,” Chanyeol said, interrupting him. “Sorry! I mean. He said to come find him after the set.”
“Oh? Do you have an admirer,” Baekhyun said so that only Chanyeol could hear, and Chanyeol laughed at him. “Scram.”
It got Baekhyun two things - Chanyeol off his bar, and several minutes later, Yixing beelining toward him.
***
People caught at Chanyeol as he walked, giving him compliments, asking when they’d be back. He tried to keep up with Yixing as much as possible, up to the point where Yixing finally was waiting for him beside a table. Beside him was a man who looked composed. Chanyeol isn’t going to say Kris wasn’t the type who usually came to see them play because he’d seen every kind of person imaginable, but there was something reserved there.
“This is my friend Kris,” Yixing said, almost pulling Chanyeol in. “We stayed last week and decided to again. I thought you had a lot in common.”
The way that Yixing beamed up at both of them in sequence made it pretty obvious what he was talking about and Chanyeol couldn’t help the laugh.
And then Yixing abandoned them for Baekhyun.
It was not the thing Chanyeol was best at. If he had music around, or someone to joke off of. Humor was how he dealt with that. Making people laugh was a good indicator if they would be charmed by him or find him to be someone they wanted to run away from. He really preferred people to like him, unless they were people he didn’t like himself, but even then.
“You made Yixing stay all this time just to hear me?” Chanyeol joked, holding up a hand to his chest like he was flattered. Kris blinked at him, which was nearly a recoil, before he chuckled and Chanyeol realized he’d stepped in it again. “Sorry. Some people tend to think I’m really full of myself when I say those things. I’m Chanyeol. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you,” Kris said. “So are you? Full of yourself?”
“Not more than normal, I think. Though, sometimes it depends on how short the person I’m talking with is.”
Kris grinned at that, clearly in no danger of being offended by those kind of jokes.
“Yixing is great, isn’t he? How’d you end up coming with him?”
If nothing else, he had questions. People were still filing out, employees starting to straighten up tables and chairs. Chanyeol gave half a thought to his abandoned guitar safe in its case behind the stage. Kyungsoo had other plans, and Jongdae- Chanyeol wasn’t sure, because all Jongdae had done was grin and wave at him. In retrospect, he might ought to have been concerned by that. Though right then, he just wanted to get Kris to laugh with him again. Or even at him. He got more smiles, though. It grew progressively quieter around them, the doors locked as the last patrons were out. Chanyeol was an honorary employee - through Baekhyun and the music, so no one hassled him and his urge to peek over Kris’s fence and see what was on the other side.
Chanyeol caught movement out of the corner of his eye, Baekhyun leaning over the bar in rapt attention of Yixing. Every so often his hand would flap as he talked, his grin turning just a bit sharp in the edges. Oh. Well, Baekhyun wasn’t dating anyone, and Yixing was nice.
There was silence in his own conversation and his head swiveled back. Kris’s mouth was pursed, and Chanyeol bared his teeth in apology.
“Sorry, I missed the last thing you said,” he confessed.
Kris let out some kind of half laugh that Chanyeol for a moment wasn’t sure was amused or irritated. But it was a laugh. It counted.
“I was asking if Baekhyun was free. Usually we go find food after. You guys could join us.”
“Sure,” Chanyeol said. He knew Baekhyun was free, and he had no qualms against speaking for him, too, since if the expression was any indication, Baekhyun would want to. He got to make those calls sometimes. “I get too nervous to eat before sometimes, so-“
Baekhyun wasn’t behind the bar. Yixing wasn’t sitting in front of it. Chanyeol tilted his head as he stared to where they’d just been two minutes before. Maybe they’d gone to the bathroom. Together. Right.
“If we can find them,” Chanyeol said, a bit bewildered.
Kris followed him as he pushed his way into the back room. There was a little office off to the side, he knew, because he sometimes locked himself in there and napped until Baekhyun was free. But, he didn’t get his hand onto the door knob to check if Baekhyun was in there before he heard a thump.
And a moan.
And not the kind of “I’ve fallen and I need help” kind of moan, definitely from Baekhyun’s vocal cords.
It was followed by a different sound, someone else. Someone his wide-eyed glance at Kris confirmed was probably Yixing.
Kris gestured, all but ushering him back out to the bar where Chanyeol’s face caught up with his brain, flushing as he covered his mouth and nearly hicced a giggle.
“I guess they don’t need food,” Chanyeol said.
Kris cleared his throat. “Yeah, I guess not. Should we wait?”
Chanyeol turned his head, at least until he realized it might look like he was trying to listen in on the festivities. He thought about what Baekhyun would want. “Nah. I’ll text him and tell him we’re leaving. They might want to head home together or something.”
“Wouldn’t want to be in the way,” Kris agreed, lips twitching.
It was easy to grab his guitar, sweeping for anything he’d missed and making sure the side door was locked behind him.
“You have some place you like?” he asked, nearly bouncing in place.
“This way,” Kris said, and pressed his hand to Chanyeol’s back to guide him.
That was one thing that didn’t take him any time at all to decide he liked.
***
Having to keep up awkward sounds while avoiding Yixing’s eyes was in some ways a difficult thing. His hand slapped against the wall, nearly making him giggle as they watched a shadow outside of the door. He’d dropped his head back, moaning like someone was sucking at his neck, until the shadow had disappeared. It had to be him, because he knew Chanyeol would be the one to come back looking for them, and Chanyeol was the one who’d recognize his voice. Awkward, but hardly the most awkward thing that had ever happened in his friendship with Chanyeol. They’d stayed moderately quiet after that, Yixing echoing him in a way that hadn’t made it hard to respond, until they heard the outside door open and then slam shut.
For a moment, all they did was breathe.
“You think they bought it?” Baekhyun asked. “I should’ve brought my phone in with me. He probably texted me if he left.”
Yixing shrugged, walking with him to the door so they could listen. “Maybe. I guess we’ll see. I feel like I owe you coffee or something.”
That had Baekhyun turning to him. “What? Why?”
“Well, for helping with them. But you’re also the only person I’ve ever had pretend sex with. I don’t know what to do.”
Baekhyun might’ve laughed, had anyone said that to him quite so seriously and kept looking at him in the same way. Maybe there was humor in Yixing’s eyes or in the quirk of his lips. But when he looked down Baekhyun’s body, Baekhyun wondered for a moment how long it would stay pretend.
***
Kris bought him dinner, which had not been part of the plan - not that there’d been a plan to start with. Dinner was putting a nice name to the food they’d grazed on as they walked. Though Kris had offered to stop in case the guitar was heavy, but Chanyeol waved him off and he wasn’t even trying to be macho about it. He couldn’t have imagined that having friends almost making out in front of them would be a good icebreaker, but that night at least, it worked. Almost every time Baekhyun or Yixing were brought up, they shared a glance, and that nearly made Chanyeol laugh more than anything else. He took note of Kris’s strides, and the way he talked with his hands, and how he pursed his lips. There were people that were just more naturally comfortable to be around, not ones that took a little while to find the rhythm of. He hadn’t expected that in Kris. They finally stopped with little cups of ice cream, taking up nearly a whole bench between the two of them and the guitar.
That Chanyeol liked to touch was no surprise to himself. He liked to shake shoulders and give bear hugs and high five and lean in. The more comfortable he was, the more he wanted that. Not everyone was cool with that. Jongin had at first tried elbowing him to get him away. It wasn’t so much that Jongin had gotten used to it, but they’d gotten comfortable with each other. But when he leaned into Kris’s shoulder, Kris didn’t move away. Stiffened a little maybe, but not much.
“Obvious question,” Chanyeol said, pointing his spoon at Kris in a way that most people would find rude. “You like music?”
Kris grinned. “Yeah.”
“I know Yixing writes his songs, and he sings. Do you…?”
“No. Though, when he has a new song I help him with lyrics sometimes. He likes getting input, getting new emotions to put into stuff.”
“Ahhh.” And Chanyeol hummed. “I like writing and arranging stuff. It doesn’t always work out, but it’s fun. Baekhyun helps me, sings and stuff. He sings on his own, though, nights he’s not working. You sing?”
“Nothing like Jongdae,” Kris said, and it made Chanyeol gasp with laughter.
“Yeah. No one does. When he and Kyungsoo and Baekhyun get together…”
“You sound good, too.”
“Ah.” He hated that he went a bit bashful but there wasn’t anything he could do to help it. “I really like it. I like the rush I get. I think if I was stuck in my room all day I’d just explode.”
“Messy.”
“I don’t need any help with that,” Chanyeol cackled.
“I like my alone time. Yixing is probably more social than I am sometimes, but he’ll fall into himself and forget everything but showering and eating and music for days if he’s allowed. Sometimes I think he forgets how to speak when I pull him out of it. But then he drags me to see him perform, so it works.”
“And then abandons you to make out with my friend,” Chanyeol said.
“That’s the first time that’s happened,” Kris said, almost sound a little bewildered.
“Are you usually the one picking someone up?”
Kris turned to him then, eyes narrowing and Chanyeol nearly recoiled. “What about you? You have this talented band. People must be swarming to go home with you.”
“You didn’t answer.” But when Kris just raised an eyebrow, Chanyeol’s resolve disappeared. “No. I mean, Kyungsoo gets most of the girls, and Jongdae is allergic to casual. I have admirers, but…I guess I’m picky.”
“I’ll have to watch out to make sure your fans don’t take a hit out on me,” Kris said.
And it was the first time that Chanyeol knew, rather than really hoped, that Kris was flirting with him. Of course, Kris looked away almost immediately like he was embarrassed, and Chanyeol grinned at the wall.
“Yixing maybe won’t want you to come along any more if he’s going out with Baekhyun after,” Chanyeol said. “But at least you’ll still have a reason if I’m there.”
The least he could do was flirt right back.
***
Chanyeol cursed all of his morning-functional brain cells when he realized not only had Kris been flirting with him, but that Chanyeol had hiked up his guitar and marched into the sunset (moonset, no one was counting) without getting a number or setting up another meeting. Half that reason had been because Kris had gotten a text and said he had to go, to which Chanyeol had politely told him to have a good evening and then beamed when Kris smiled at him.
And then they’d parted ways. It wasn’t like he could’ve pried Kris’s phone out of his hand or flung a paper airplane after him with his number on it.
Chanyeol consoled himself that he had just assumed that Baekhyun would be able to hook him up with the required information. Subconsciously.
Baekhyun didn’t even flinch when Chanyeol turned on the full-force patented Park Investigating Stare that his mother had passed down to him.
“What?” Baekhyun asked, his voice purposely bland because he knew it would make Chanyeol explode and Chanyeol really couldn’t help that.
“What? What what? Did you sleep with him? Did he love on you all night long? What happened?”
“No, no, and things,” Baekhyun said, sitting back all smug and then even smugger when he evaded Chanyeol’s kick. “He’s cute. I told you that.”
“Right. You’ve told me other guys are cute but you’re not making sex noises with them in your office. I’m going to need therapy by the way. You should’ve just told us to go.”
“You would have wanted to know why,” Baekhyun said, laughing even harder when Chanyeol scowled. “So how is Kris? Did you sleep with him? Did he love on you-“
“No! I just met him,” Chanyeol squawked.
“Kyungsoo would be proud,” Baekhyun said, patting Chanyeol’s hand.
“He’s really. His face. Did you see his fingers? Everything he picks up looks tiny when he was holding it.”
“He has a face, and he has hands.” After a moment, Baekhyun nodded. “I guess those are good dating requirements.”
They stared at each other for a moment, and then Chanyeol cracked.
“Well, he has Yixing for a friend, so he has to be pretty cool, right? If Yixing is so nice.”
He dragged out the word, adding layers of meaning to it until it almost looked like Baekhyun was blushing.
“So when’s Yixing performing again?”
Chanyeol had two reasons for asking that. One, because it meant bugging Baekhyun about it, and then the second was getting to know when Kris would be back.
“I think the same day,” Baekhyun said. “That’s when he’s shown up the last couple of weeks.”
Chanyeol blinked at him. “You mean you don’t know?”
“I don’t have his number,” Baekhyun said, giving his mug a violent twist. “Maybe I should get it.”
“You think?”
For easier access to booty calls if nothing more, though he didn’t say that because the way Baekhyun was acting made Chanyeol think that there was maybe a little more going on there.
“You can do it,” Chanyeol said in his best motivational voice, holding out his fist for an obligatory bump.
Baekhyun mostly just smacked at it with his hand, but it counted all the same.
***
The crowd was gone. The lights behind the bar were off. The stage lights were off. And yet, Baekhyun was rapt, watching Yixing’s fingers against the guitar strings. The sound was mellow, but Baekhyun felt anything but that. All Baekhyun had had to do to get Chanyeol to drag Kris out the door was to waggle his eyebrows. It hadn’t helped when he’d turned around to see Yixing biting his bottom lip in amusement.
“Did Kris have fun out with Chanyeol?” he’d ventured.
“He blustered when I tried to tease him about it,” Yixing told him, grinning. “You should see his face when Chanyeol sings.”
When Chanyeol had been standing by Kris, it had looked liked they would fit right together. Though they had a lot to learn about each other, and Baekhyun wondered if it could be that easy. Guy comes in to see band play, gets to meet one of them, lives happily ever after. Though Baekhyun wondered for himself, too. Part-time bartender meets performer with a pretty voice, and pretends to make out with him to set up his friend.
He half wished he’d just grabbed Yixing and done it for real.
“You play?” Yixing asked, wiggling the guitar in his lap.
“A little. I learned a little in school, and then a little out of self-defense when Chanyeol really got into it. Mostly so I can do duets and stuff with him or whatever.”
“Want to?”
Yixing offered him the guitar. Baekhyun should’ve said that he didn’t play anywhere near enough to play in front of Yixing. The guitar wasn’t hugely cumbersome, but he took it carefully. He ran his thumb along a string, and felt his fingers forming a chord almost without thought.
“I taught myself, mostly,” Yixing said as Baekhyun gently strummed. “Guitar, piano. I needed to be able to hear the songs in my head on something real, not just my voice. And if I knew how to play, I didn’t have to wait for anyone.”
“That’s amazing.”
Yixing just shook his head, and Baekhyun thought of Yixing on the chair, foot tapping to the rhythm his hands took as he sang for the people in front of him. Baekhyun could, if he had to, but he preferred to sing to music he wasn’t making. Baekhyun started picking out a song he knew, and the way Yixing stared bobbing his head told Baekhyun he knew it, too. It was Yixing who started singing, like the music almost made him. Baekhyun joined him through the chorus, the easy chords making it easy to keep playing and sing along. He grinned as Yixing embellished on the second verse, laughing as Yixing ushered him right into the chorus again, repeating it with gusto. But Baekhyun sang the last few lines alone, trailing off when he realized Yixing was just staring at him.
“What?” he asked, trying to joke.
Yixing shook his head, like he didn’t know what he wanted to say.
But when Yixing leaned toward him, Baekhyun’s fingers slid down the guitar strings. And when Yixing kissed him, Baekhyun nearly nuzzled into him, chuckling as Yixing kissed him again. Yixing’s hand curled at his collar, and Baekhyun smiled against Yixing’s lips.
After that night, he would never look at the stage in quite the same way again.
***
In terms of being Very Subtle, Baekhyun failed miserably. Though, if Chanyeol was going to be set up by Baekhyun’s little smirk, at least it was with someone- Yeah, Chanyeol couldn’t even look at Kris while he thought that, and that was a sure sign. He knew the progression, how he was going to start wanting to talk to Kris more often, to spend time with him. A dinner once a week, for Chanyeol anyway, wasn’t enough. He knew what he needed, how he liked to date.
That didn’t include falling asleep after buying Kris dinner. It had been his turn, he argued, and Kris hadn’t fought much. It had given him great pleasure to hand over the cash. Maybe the food had even tasted better because of it. But then, maybe all that satisfaction had gone to his head. The bench had been comfortable, Kris’s thigh had been comfortable.
His first thought was embarrassment that he had fallen asleep, at least until he heard Kris breathing and realized Kris was asleep as well. The steady weight of his guitar case against his leg had caused a sort of painful indent in his skin and he moved it out of the way so he could stretch out his leg. But doing that meant that Kris woke, coming out of sleep with a cute and tiny gasp.
“I was just going to close my eyes when you fell asleep,” Kris said, chuckling as he raised his hand to his face. “I didn’t want to just elbow you or leave you here.”
Chanyeol half straightened. “I hope you don’t think I think you’re boring.”
“No!”
“Am I cute sleeping at least?” he asked, and Kris’s laugh was answer enough.
“Maybe I should let you go home if you’re tired.”
“Maybe we should meet up earlier,” Chanyeol mused. “I could text you.”
Kris swiveled toward him. “Do you have my number?”
Chanyeol shook his head, and was still laughing at his own joke as he queued up his address book and put in Kris’s number. A few second later, Kris’s phone chimed. He leaned against Kris’s shoulder and oversaw the inputting of his name.
Kris put a sleeping emoticon next to it.
“Hey,” Chanyeol protested, laughing as Kris jerked the phone away so Chanyeol couldn’t change it. “I like your phone.”
When Kris turned his head to look at him, the look was suspicious. “Yeah? Me too.”
Chanyeol nearly gulped, wondering exactly what it was they were talking about right then. Kris was supposed to go. He was waiting for that.
“Where did you go to school?” Kris asked, his arm nearly catching Chanyeol’s head as he stretched it out.
That was not almost-leaving conversation. And the arm that was pressed against the back of the bench didn’t stay there long, settling around Chanyeol’s shoulders as Chanyeol told him all the sordid stories of skinned knees and towering over his classmates. Unsurprisingly, that struck a bit of a chord.
“When I tell Baekhyun things like that he steps on my toes,” Chanyeol said.
“I think I’m a little taller than you.”
Chanyeol raised his eyebrows. “Prove it?”
“I will.”
Though he was apparently in no hurry to do so since he didn’t let Chanyeol go, or make any move to leave.
But when Kris finally did prove it, Chanyeol was barefoot in Kris’s apartment, back against a wall.
When Kris leaned into kiss him, Chanyeol believed him.
***
Was there enough room in the bed for the three of them, that was the question. According to their sleeping configuration, no, because Chanyeol was on the wrong side of the bed. Kris had not looked betrayed at the suggestion, but the “no” had been very quick in coming.
Still, he felt like he had a right to complain.
“Kris won’t let me bring my guitar to bed!” Chanyeol mourned. “Do you let Yixing?”
Baekhyun was still laughing when Chanyeol hung up the phone.
***
Pairing: Kris/Chanyeol, Yixing/Baekhyun
Rating: PG-13
Genre: AU
Summary: When Yixing brought along a friend to watch him play, staying for the band that played after might have been the best decision of all.
***
It took three performances before Baekhyun got to meet the guy who had started coming in with his guitar and an earnest smile. What he didn’t realize that meeting him was going to be because of his seemingly earnest-smiling best friend.
“A round for me and my friend here,” Chanyeol said, smacking his hand on the bar surface and making the other patrons jerk.
Chanyeol’s life was a movie. As long as he didn’t shatter the glasses, or simulating shooting up the doors, it was good.
“Anything you wish, Master Park. And what’ll your friend have?” Baekhyun asked, smiling.
“Yixing. And…I like anything. Whatever Chanyeol likes?” Yixing said.
Straight up beer, then. Every so often he’d let Baekhyun mix him a drink. For some reason he thought Chanyeol thought it was beneath him.
“Wasn’t he amazing on stage?”
As Baekhyun slid the glasses over - beer for Yixing and Chanyeol’s typical pre-performance water - Baekhyun realized Chanyeol was doing his “I like you, but I’m smiling at you like a creep” impression at poor Yixing.
“Yeah, amazing,” Baekhyun said. “Go get your guitar ready.”
“It is. It is! I hope you come back next week,” Chanyeol told Yixing just before finishing his water and disappearing backstage.
When Yixing smiled at Baekhyun, a dimple appeared, stamping all his rational thoughts into so much dust.
“He’s a-“ Baekhyun said, waving ineffectually to where Chanyeol had gone.
“I can’t wait to hear him. He made me promise I’d stay. I think he has my guitar hostage. So I could enjoy it?”
Baekhyun laughed. That sounded exactly right. Yixing had been the easy listening part of the night’s entertainment, heartfelt lyrics and strumming guitar that fostered some conversation and rapt attention. When there hadn’t been any customers calling on him, he’d leaned back and watched the way Yixing’s eyes closed, the way he held his guitar. He didn’t know where Yixing had been found, but he’d found a place there. Two weeks, and he hadn’t even so much as been able to give Yixing a thumbs up. And then he was at his bar.
“Oh, my friend Kris,” Yixing said, and a tall man parted the crowd to get to him. “He came with me to watch.”
“Was it good?” Yixing asked, and Baekhyun tried to look busy like he wasn’t eavesdropping. He watched Chanyeol stomp onto the stage, with Kyungsoo settling at the keyboard and Jongdae at another mic.
“Very good,” Kris said, just as Chanyeol said, “I hope everyone’s having a great night tonight.”
It was Chanyeol’s voice, deep and a bit breathy from nerves, and Kris swiveled to look. Kris. Tight smile when he’d come up to the bar.
Between Chanyeol’s guitar, the keyboard, and Kyungsoo’s opening note, the whole of the room’s attention was on the stage. Chanyeol stepped up to the mic, his hair just a shade long and flopping, and started to sing.
“Close your mouth,” Baekhyun heard, and looked to see it was Yixing speaking to Kris. Yixing smiled at Baekhyun. “We’ll go listen.”
He regretted Yixing sliding off the bar stool, but two other customers sidled up to take their place, and he smiled, putting out napkins and asking what they wanted. It kept him busy until after Chanyeol’s set, the room progressively getting quieter as people trickled out. The bar was officially closed, and he set to cleaning and getting ready for the next night. When he left that night, it was with Chanyeol who was both sleepy and buzzing full of energy.
It was another week before Yixing showed up again, making Baekhyun forget his customers as he sang. It didn’t even take Chanyeol to drag Yixing to the bar, dimpling as he gave his order.
“Something with fruit?” Yixing asked.
Baekhyun ran through a few options in his head before settling on one. “You here alone tonight?”
“No. Kris was more eager to come this week. I think he enjoyed what came after me more, though.”
Baekhyun barely kept his eyebrows from raising. “Oh. Yeah, those three have been terrorizing each other and writing music for ages. I probably did some of that, too.”
He had to abandon Yixing to look after customers. But when Yixing stayed at the bar the first two songs before going to find Kris, Baekhyun felt…pleased. He thought that was the word.
When the stage went dark, Baekhyun was already cleaning and Chanyeol draped himself dramatically over the polished wood.
“Well?”
Baekhyun rolled his eyes at the obvious fish for a compliment. But that didn’t mean he was going to keep secrets.
“Hey, I think Yixing-“
“Oh, right,” Chanyeol said, interrupting him. “Sorry! I mean. He said to come find him after the set.”
“Oh? Do you have an admirer,” Baekhyun said so that only Chanyeol could hear, and Chanyeol laughed at him. “Scram.”
It got Baekhyun two things - Chanyeol off his bar, and several minutes later, Yixing beelining toward him.
***
People caught at Chanyeol as he walked, giving him compliments, asking when they’d be back. He tried to keep up with Yixing as much as possible, up to the point where Yixing finally was waiting for him beside a table. Beside him was a man who looked composed. Chanyeol isn’t going to say Kris wasn’t the type who usually came to see them play because he’d seen every kind of person imaginable, but there was something reserved there.
“This is my friend Kris,” Yixing said, almost pulling Chanyeol in. “We stayed last week and decided to again. I thought you had a lot in common.”
The way that Yixing beamed up at both of them in sequence made it pretty obvious what he was talking about and Chanyeol couldn’t help the laugh.
And then Yixing abandoned them for Baekhyun.
It was not the thing Chanyeol was best at. If he had music around, or someone to joke off of. Humor was how he dealt with that. Making people laugh was a good indicator if they would be charmed by him or find him to be someone they wanted to run away from. He really preferred people to like him, unless they were people he didn’t like himself, but even then.
“You made Yixing stay all this time just to hear me?” Chanyeol joked, holding up a hand to his chest like he was flattered. Kris blinked at him, which was nearly a recoil, before he chuckled and Chanyeol realized he’d stepped in it again. “Sorry. Some people tend to think I’m really full of myself when I say those things. I’m Chanyeol. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you,” Kris said. “So are you? Full of yourself?”
“Not more than normal, I think. Though, sometimes it depends on how short the person I’m talking with is.”
Kris grinned at that, clearly in no danger of being offended by those kind of jokes.
“Yixing is great, isn’t he? How’d you end up coming with him?”
If nothing else, he had questions. People were still filing out, employees starting to straighten up tables and chairs. Chanyeol gave half a thought to his abandoned guitar safe in its case behind the stage. Kyungsoo had other plans, and Jongdae- Chanyeol wasn’t sure, because all Jongdae had done was grin and wave at him. In retrospect, he might ought to have been concerned by that. Though right then, he just wanted to get Kris to laugh with him again. Or even at him. He got more smiles, though. It grew progressively quieter around them, the doors locked as the last patrons were out. Chanyeol was an honorary employee - through Baekhyun and the music, so no one hassled him and his urge to peek over Kris’s fence and see what was on the other side.
Chanyeol caught movement out of the corner of his eye, Baekhyun leaning over the bar in rapt attention of Yixing. Every so often his hand would flap as he talked, his grin turning just a bit sharp in the edges. Oh. Well, Baekhyun wasn’t dating anyone, and Yixing was nice.
There was silence in his own conversation and his head swiveled back. Kris’s mouth was pursed, and Chanyeol bared his teeth in apology.
“Sorry, I missed the last thing you said,” he confessed.
Kris let out some kind of half laugh that Chanyeol for a moment wasn’t sure was amused or irritated. But it was a laugh. It counted.
“I was asking if Baekhyun was free. Usually we go find food after. You guys could join us.”
“Sure,” Chanyeol said. He knew Baekhyun was free, and he had no qualms against speaking for him, too, since if the expression was any indication, Baekhyun would want to. He got to make those calls sometimes. “I get too nervous to eat before sometimes, so-“
Baekhyun wasn’t behind the bar. Yixing wasn’t sitting in front of it. Chanyeol tilted his head as he stared to where they’d just been two minutes before. Maybe they’d gone to the bathroom. Together. Right.
“If we can find them,” Chanyeol said, a bit bewildered.
Kris followed him as he pushed his way into the back room. There was a little office off to the side, he knew, because he sometimes locked himself in there and napped until Baekhyun was free. But, he didn’t get his hand onto the door knob to check if Baekhyun was in there before he heard a thump.
And a moan.
And not the kind of “I’ve fallen and I need help” kind of moan, definitely from Baekhyun’s vocal cords.
It was followed by a different sound, someone else. Someone his wide-eyed glance at Kris confirmed was probably Yixing.
Kris gestured, all but ushering him back out to the bar where Chanyeol’s face caught up with his brain, flushing as he covered his mouth and nearly hicced a giggle.
“I guess they don’t need food,” Chanyeol said.
Kris cleared his throat. “Yeah, I guess not. Should we wait?”
Chanyeol turned his head, at least until he realized it might look like he was trying to listen in on the festivities. He thought about what Baekhyun would want. “Nah. I’ll text him and tell him we’re leaving. They might want to head home together or something.”
“Wouldn’t want to be in the way,” Kris agreed, lips twitching.
It was easy to grab his guitar, sweeping for anything he’d missed and making sure the side door was locked behind him.
“You have some place you like?” he asked, nearly bouncing in place.
“This way,” Kris said, and pressed his hand to Chanyeol’s back to guide him.
That was one thing that didn’t take him any time at all to decide he liked.
***
Having to keep up awkward sounds while avoiding Yixing’s eyes was in some ways a difficult thing. His hand slapped against the wall, nearly making him giggle as they watched a shadow outside of the door. He’d dropped his head back, moaning like someone was sucking at his neck, until the shadow had disappeared. It had to be him, because he knew Chanyeol would be the one to come back looking for them, and Chanyeol was the one who’d recognize his voice. Awkward, but hardly the most awkward thing that had ever happened in his friendship with Chanyeol. They’d stayed moderately quiet after that, Yixing echoing him in a way that hadn’t made it hard to respond, until they heard the outside door open and then slam shut.
For a moment, all they did was breathe.
“You think they bought it?” Baekhyun asked. “I should’ve brought my phone in with me. He probably texted me if he left.”
Yixing shrugged, walking with him to the door so they could listen. “Maybe. I guess we’ll see. I feel like I owe you coffee or something.”
That had Baekhyun turning to him. “What? Why?”
“Well, for helping with them. But you’re also the only person I’ve ever had pretend sex with. I don’t know what to do.”
Baekhyun might’ve laughed, had anyone said that to him quite so seriously and kept looking at him in the same way. Maybe there was humor in Yixing’s eyes or in the quirk of his lips. But when he looked down Baekhyun’s body, Baekhyun wondered for a moment how long it would stay pretend.
***
Kris bought him dinner, which had not been part of the plan - not that there’d been a plan to start with. Dinner was putting a nice name to the food they’d grazed on as they walked. Though Kris had offered to stop in case the guitar was heavy, but Chanyeol waved him off and he wasn’t even trying to be macho about it. He couldn’t have imagined that having friends almost making out in front of them would be a good icebreaker, but that night at least, it worked. Almost every time Baekhyun or Yixing were brought up, they shared a glance, and that nearly made Chanyeol laugh more than anything else. He took note of Kris’s strides, and the way he talked with his hands, and how he pursed his lips. There were people that were just more naturally comfortable to be around, not ones that took a little while to find the rhythm of. He hadn’t expected that in Kris. They finally stopped with little cups of ice cream, taking up nearly a whole bench between the two of them and the guitar.
That Chanyeol liked to touch was no surprise to himself. He liked to shake shoulders and give bear hugs and high five and lean in. The more comfortable he was, the more he wanted that. Not everyone was cool with that. Jongin had at first tried elbowing him to get him away. It wasn’t so much that Jongin had gotten used to it, but they’d gotten comfortable with each other. But when he leaned into Kris’s shoulder, Kris didn’t move away. Stiffened a little maybe, but not much.
“Obvious question,” Chanyeol said, pointing his spoon at Kris in a way that most people would find rude. “You like music?”
Kris grinned. “Yeah.”
“I know Yixing writes his songs, and he sings. Do you…?”
“No. Though, when he has a new song I help him with lyrics sometimes. He likes getting input, getting new emotions to put into stuff.”
“Ahhh.” And Chanyeol hummed. “I like writing and arranging stuff. It doesn’t always work out, but it’s fun. Baekhyun helps me, sings and stuff. He sings on his own, though, nights he’s not working. You sing?”
“Nothing like Jongdae,” Kris said, and it made Chanyeol gasp with laughter.
“Yeah. No one does. When he and Kyungsoo and Baekhyun get together…”
“You sound good, too.”
“Ah.” He hated that he went a bit bashful but there wasn’t anything he could do to help it. “I really like it. I like the rush I get. I think if I was stuck in my room all day I’d just explode.”
“Messy.”
“I don’t need any help with that,” Chanyeol cackled.
“I like my alone time. Yixing is probably more social than I am sometimes, but he’ll fall into himself and forget everything but showering and eating and music for days if he’s allowed. Sometimes I think he forgets how to speak when I pull him out of it. But then he drags me to see him perform, so it works.”
“And then abandons you to make out with my friend,” Chanyeol said.
“That’s the first time that’s happened,” Kris said, almost sound a little bewildered.
“Are you usually the one picking someone up?”
Kris turned to him then, eyes narrowing and Chanyeol nearly recoiled. “What about you? You have this talented band. People must be swarming to go home with you.”
“You didn’t answer.” But when Kris just raised an eyebrow, Chanyeol’s resolve disappeared. “No. I mean, Kyungsoo gets most of the girls, and Jongdae is allergic to casual. I have admirers, but…I guess I’m picky.”
“I’ll have to watch out to make sure your fans don’t take a hit out on me,” Kris said.
And it was the first time that Chanyeol knew, rather than really hoped, that Kris was flirting with him. Of course, Kris looked away almost immediately like he was embarrassed, and Chanyeol grinned at the wall.
“Yixing maybe won’t want you to come along any more if he’s going out with Baekhyun after,” Chanyeol said. “But at least you’ll still have a reason if I’m there.”
The least he could do was flirt right back.
***
Chanyeol cursed all of his morning-functional brain cells when he realized not only had Kris been flirting with him, but that Chanyeol had hiked up his guitar and marched into the sunset (moonset, no one was counting) without getting a number or setting up another meeting. Half that reason had been because Kris had gotten a text and said he had to go, to which Chanyeol had politely told him to have a good evening and then beamed when Kris smiled at him.
And then they’d parted ways. It wasn’t like he could’ve pried Kris’s phone out of his hand or flung a paper airplane after him with his number on it.
Chanyeol consoled himself that he had just assumed that Baekhyun would be able to hook him up with the required information. Subconsciously.
Baekhyun didn’t even flinch when Chanyeol turned on the full-force patented Park Investigating Stare that his mother had passed down to him.
“What?” Baekhyun asked, his voice purposely bland because he knew it would make Chanyeol explode and Chanyeol really couldn’t help that.
“What? What what? Did you sleep with him? Did he love on you all night long? What happened?”
“No, no, and things,” Baekhyun said, sitting back all smug and then even smugger when he evaded Chanyeol’s kick. “He’s cute. I told you that.”
“Right. You’ve told me other guys are cute but you’re not making sex noises with them in your office. I’m going to need therapy by the way. You should’ve just told us to go.”
“You would have wanted to know why,” Baekhyun said, laughing even harder when Chanyeol scowled. “So how is Kris? Did you sleep with him? Did he love on you-“
“No! I just met him,” Chanyeol squawked.
“Kyungsoo would be proud,” Baekhyun said, patting Chanyeol’s hand.
“He’s really. His face. Did you see his fingers? Everything he picks up looks tiny when he was holding it.”
“He has a face, and he has hands.” After a moment, Baekhyun nodded. “I guess those are good dating requirements.”
They stared at each other for a moment, and then Chanyeol cracked.
“Well, he has Yixing for a friend, so he has to be pretty cool, right? If Yixing is so nice.”
He dragged out the word, adding layers of meaning to it until it almost looked like Baekhyun was blushing.
“So when’s Yixing performing again?”
Chanyeol had two reasons for asking that. One, because it meant bugging Baekhyun about it, and then the second was getting to know when Kris would be back.
“I think the same day,” Baekhyun said. “That’s when he’s shown up the last couple of weeks.”
Chanyeol blinked at him. “You mean you don’t know?”
“I don’t have his number,” Baekhyun said, giving his mug a violent twist. “Maybe I should get it.”
“You think?”
For easier access to booty calls if nothing more, though he didn’t say that because the way Baekhyun was acting made Chanyeol think that there was maybe a little more going on there.
“You can do it,” Chanyeol said in his best motivational voice, holding out his fist for an obligatory bump.
Baekhyun mostly just smacked at it with his hand, but it counted all the same.
***
The crowd was gone. The lights behind the bar were off. The stage lights were off. And yet, Baekhyun was rapt, watching Yixing’s fingers against the guitar strings. The sound was mellow, but Baekhyun felt anything but that. All Baekhyun had had to do to get Chanyeol to drag Kris out the door was to waggle his eyebrows. It hadn’t helped when he’d turned around to see Yixing biting his bottom lip in amusement.
“Did Kris have fun out with Chanyeol?” he’d ventured.
“He blustered when I tried to tease him about it,” Yixing told him, grinning. “You should see his face when Chanyeol sings.”
When Chanyeol had been standing by Kris, it had looked liked they would fit right together. Though they had a lot to learn about each other, and Baekhyun wondered if it could be that easy. Guy comes in to see band play, gets to meet one of them, lives happily ever after. Though Baekhyun wondered for himself, too. Part-time bartender meets performer with a pretty voice, and pretends to make out with him to set up his friend.
He half wished he’d just grabbed Yixing and done it for real.
“You play?” Yixing asked, wiggling the guitar in his lap.
“A little. I learned a little in school, and then a little out of self-defense when Chanyeol really got into it. Mostly so I can do duets and stuff with him or whatever.”
“Want to?”
Yixing offered him the guitar. Baekhyun should’ve said that he didn’t play anywhere near enough to play in front of Yixing. The guitar wasn’t hugely cumbersome, but he took it carefully. He ran his thumb along a string, and felt his fingers forming a chord almost without thought.
“I taught myself, mostly,” Yixing said as Baekhyun gently strummed. “Guitar, piano. I needed to be able to hear the songs in my head on something real, not just my voice. And if I knew how to play, I didn’t have to wait for anyone.”
“That’s amazing.”
Yixing just shook his head, and Baekhyun thought of Yixing on the chair, foot tapping to the rhythm his hands took as he sang for the people in front of him. Baekhyun could, if he had to, but he preferred to sing to music he wasn’t making. Baekhyun started picking out a song he knew, and the way Yixing stared bobbing his head told Baekhyun he knew it, too. It was Yixing who started singing, like the music almost made him. Baekhyun joined him through the chorus, the easy chords making it easy to keep playing and sing along. He grinned as Yixing embellished on the second verse, laughing as Yixing ushered him right into the chorus again, repeating it with gusto. But Baekhyun sang the last few lines alone, trailing off when he realized Yixing was just staring at him.
“What?” he asked, trying to joke.
Yixing shook his head, like he didn’t know what he wanted to say.
But when Yixing leaned toward him, Baekhyun’s fingers slid down the guitar strings. And when Yixing kissed him, Baekhyun nearly nuzzled into him, chuckling as Yixing kissed him again. Yixing’s hand curled at his collar, and Baekhyun smiled against Yixing’s lips.
After that night, he would never look at the stage in quite the same way again.
***
In terms of being Very Subtle, Baekhyun failed miserably. Though, if Chanyeol was going to be set up by Baekhyun’s little smirk, at least it was with someone- Yeah, Chanyeol couldn’t even look at Kris while he thought that, and that was a sure sign. He knew the progression, how he was going to start wanting to talk to Kris more often, to spend time with him. A dinner once a week, for Chanyeol anyway, wasn’t enough. He knew what he needed, how he liked to date.
That didn’t include falling asleep after buying Kris dinner. It had been his turn, he argued, and Kris hadn’t fought much. It had given him great pleasure to hand over the cash. Maybe the food had even tasted better because of it. But then, maybe all that satisfaction had gone to his head. The bench had been comfortable, Kris’s thigh had been comfortable.
His first thought was embarrassment that he had fallen asleep, at least until he heard Kris breathing and realized Kris was asleep as well. The steady weight of his guitar case against his leg had caused a sort of painful indent in his skin and he moved it out of the way so he could stretch out his leg. But doing that meant that Kris woke, coming out of sleep with a cute and tiny gasp.
“I was just going to close my eyes when you fell asleep,” Kris said, chuckling as he raised his hand to his face. “I didn’t want to just elbow you or leave you here.”
Chanyeol half straightened. “I hope you don’t think I think you’re boring.”
“No!”
“Am I cute sleeping at least?” he asked, and Kris’s laugh was answer enough.
“Maybe I should let you go home if you’re tired.”
“Maybe we should meet up earlier,” Chanyeol mused. “I could text you.”
Kris swiveled toward him. “Do you have my number?”
Chanyeol shook his head, and was still laughing at his own joke as he queued up his address book and put in Kris’s number. A few second later, Kris’s phone chimed. He leaned against Kris’s shoulder and oversaw the inputting of his name.
Kris put a sleeping emoticon next to it.
“Hey,” Chanyeol protested, laughing as Kris jerked the phone away so Chanyeol couldn’t change it. “I like your phone.”
When Kris turned his head to look at him, the look was suspicious. “Yeah? Me too.”
Chanyeol nearly gulped, wondering exactly what it was they were talking about right then. Kris was supposed to go. He was waiting for that.
“Where did you go to school?” Kris asked, his arm nearly catching Chanyeol’s head as he stretched it out.
That was not almost-leaving conversation. And the arm that was pressed against the back of the bench didn’t stay there long, settling around Chanyeol’s shoulders as Chanyeol told him all the sordid stories of skinned knees and towering over his classmates. Unsurprisingly, that struck a bit of a chord.
“When I tell Baekhyun things like that he steps on my toes,” Chanyeol said.
“I think I’m a little taller than you.”
Chanyeol raised his eyebrows. “Prove it?”
“I will.”
Though he was apparently in no hurry to do so since he didn’t let Chanyeol go, or make any move to leave.
But when Kris finally did prove it, Chanyeol was barefoot in Kris’s apartment, back against a wall.
When Kris leaned into kiss him, Chanyeol believed him.
***
Was there enough room in the bed for the three of them, that was the question. According to their sleeping configuration, no, because Chanyeol was on the wrong side of the bed. Kris had not looked betrayed at the suggestion, but the “no” had been very quick in coming.
Still, he felt like he had a right to complain.
“Kris won’t let me bring my guitar to bed!” Chanyeol mourned. “Do you let Yixing?”
Baekhyun was still laughing when Chanyeol hung up the phone.
***