Lucidus
Lucidus
For: fopsyche94
Rating: PG
Length: 5055
Summary: Luhan finds that the brightest star isn't in the sky but in Kyungsoo.
Warning(s): I write about black holes.
Author's Note: Thank you, always to my beta J. You always add funny remarks that make me want to delete you and to keep you.
To my recipient, I hope you enjoy this~ I strayed quite a bit from the prompt but this was my take on it. Enjoy ^^
Sighing, Luhan stares at the ceiling of his bedroom, resigned to another night of restlessness. He looks without really looking at the scattered glow-in-the dark stars that Sehun had randomly stuck on the ceiling when he had been over one afternoon, claiming that hyung would at least have something to look at when he can’t sleep. They glow a soft green and it’s a familiar sight, many nights spent just looking.
He reaches over to his phone, clicking the home button to watch the screen light up. The clock reads 2:34 and that means that he’s been lying in bed for over 2 hours and that he’s been awake for over 16 hours. Exhaustion hasn’t quite set in yet; luckily, Luhan had been able to drift off to sleep yesterday, meaning that he probably wouldn’t be able to sleep until tomorrow night anyway.
Kicking off his comforter, he unplugs his phone from the charger and reaching blindly for his pants at the foot of the bed. With a practiced ease, he tugs them on and strolls out of his room, automatically snagging a jacket hung over the back of his chair. October was strolling in withnights becoming more and more chilly.
Luhan debates on turning on the lights to grab something to munch on but he decides to just snag something from one of the late night stands. He treads quietly through his dark apartment, everything already committed to memory. Jiggling the key into the lock to make sure the door’s locked, Luhan slips out of his place, jacket snug around his shoulders.
Wandering out into Seoul’s night, Luhan slid his hands into his jacket pockets, the fall air unforgiving. The few straggling cars meander by, the occasional drunk staggers by, and Luhan just walks, going in no particular direction.
He makes a quick stop to his usual ttukbokki place, greeting the kind ahjumma with a polite hello. She’s glad to see him, fussing how it’s so late and if a young man like him is out this late it would ruin his skin. He just chuckles, thankful for her small worries before handing over change to pay for the steaming bag that she hands over. They exchange small pleasantries, she asking how his writing’s been and he asking how her son has been. He eventually leaves, assuring her that he’ll try to come when it’s not quite so late.
Continuing on, he comes to his usual haunt, a small park near his place, fully equipped with multiple benches and soft streetlights to adequately light up the place. It’s always quiet, the wind rustling here and there but nothing really happens. Luhan had stumbled upon the little park hidden behind a large line of trees a few months back and since then, he constantly came at night when he just couldn’t fall asleep.
Coming to a bench directly beneath a street lamp, he cautiously opens his ttokbokki and notebook, scattering pens across the cool surface. Luhan makes do of the late night snack quickly, blowing on the steaming rice cakes, careful to not let the sauce drip onto paper.
He munches quietly, letting his mind wander. Luhan’s always loved nighttime; quieter, darker, and full of potential.
The Chinese man jots down a few notes of what he plans to do with his current novel, something that’s just barely taken off, more of just an idea. Luhan doesn’t have much beyond the background of the story and the gist of what he wants to write but he doesn’t worry, the idea will come to him eventually.
Footsteps distract him away from the inked words and Luhan looks up, toothpicks dangling out from his mouth.
A small figure walks into the park and who ever it is, freezes when they spot Luhan. The two aren’t sure what to make of the other and silence stretches.
Steam billows out from Luhan’s mouth and finally the figure moves. They take a glance back at Luhan before turning away to settle one of the benches furthest from Luhan.
He’s not quite sure what to make of the newcomer but unease sit under his stomach.
The person is not large, smaller than Luhan, but they’re draped in a large coat, black fabric from head to toe.
But neither Luhan nor the stranger say anything to each other, nor does the other move very much. Luhan eventually gets back to his notebook, keeping an eye on the other and the darkly dressed man just sips from a can and gazes upwards at the sky.
Time stretches on and Luhan ties up the remaining ttukbokki sauce. He sees the figure flinch in the corner of his eye but now the stranger is just observing him, not moving. Luhan cleans up his things, tucking the notebook into an inner pocket and makes his way out of the park, wondering why the stranger was there.
But as soon as Luhan steps foot back into his apartment, light creeping in through his windows, he shucks off his shoes and tosses his trash, filling the kettle with water for his morning cup of tea, and the odd stranger is quickly forgotten, lost in the murkiness of night.
It happens again, once, twice, thrice, the black cloaked man and him meeting at the park and neither Luhan nor the stranger make a move to say anything. It isn’t until the 6th time that someone pipes up.
“Are you stalking me?”
Luhan jerks, his pencil skiddling across the page and leaving a dark line.
“What?”
The stranger’s voice is unexpectedly young and warm. He repeats, “Are you stalking me?”
Luhan slowly turns to the stranger. Maybe his Korean isn’t that good but he’s pretty sure that the man had just asked if he was the one stalking the other man.
Closing his notebook, Luhan says slowly, “No, I’ve been coming to this park for months.”
The man steps closer and into a pool of light and the Chinese man realizes exactly how small the man is, his shoulders narrower than Luhan’s and the black makes him almost blend into the night. When Luhan manages to get a good look at his face, he squints. There’s something in the stranger’s face that looks oddly familiar and he can’t quite put his finger on it.
“Do I...know you from somewhere?” Luhan murmurs, not really expecting an answer but there’s a wry smile twisting at the man’s face.
“That sounds like a cheesy pickup line but you do happen to know me from somewhere,” the man says, stepping slower until he’s only a few meters away from Luhan, “we live in the same building. I’m live in apartment 445.”
This lights a bulb in Luhan’s brain and he finally stops squinting at the man, a small ah coming out. 445. He lives in 446. “So...you’re my neighbor then.”
“Yes, I would be. Do Kyungsoo, the one who’s lived in 445 for 6 months,” the man - Kyungsoo introduces and there’s a small smile tugging up the corners of his lips.
Luhan hastily inlines his head, returning Kyungsoo’s introduction with his own,
“Ah, Lu Han of 446.” He hesitates before tacking on, “I’m sorry that I haven’t taken time to introduce myself properly to my neighbors.”
Kyungsoo waves away his apology with a small gesture and takes a seat opposite to Luhan at his harried gesture for him to sit down. “No matter, we hold different hours from mostresidents.”
Luhan nods, accepting it before it really processes and he pauses, “Excuse me, but we”
There’s large owl-like eyes that come back from glancing at his open notebook to fixing themselves on Luhan’s eyes. With strong eyebrows and a softly sloping nose, the wide eyes would seem to soften Kyungsoo’s features, but they not only do they add an air of innocence to the baby faced man but make it appear that Kyungsoo was able to see everything. It made Luhan squirm slightly, but Kyungsoo didn’t seem to notice continuing, “Pardon me, but you seem to be most active in the late evening and night. I don’t see you often out during daylight.”
It appears that his neighbor is observant and it makes alarm bells ring in Luhan’s brain. “Um, how...might you know?” He hopes that his little scoots aren’t noticeable, but with Kyungsoo’s eyes, he probably did notice.
“You leave nearly every night at sometime between 2-3.”
“Oh.” Luhan blinked. “H-how do you…?”
Blinking for what seemed like the first time since the conversation started, Kyungsoo simply stated, “You make a lot more noise than you seem to be aware of, Luhan-sshi.”
He could feel the heat creep from his neck to his face, knowing that the blotch would spread unevenly and unattractively. Luhan coughs into the crook of his arm in an attempt to hide the flush. “Oh, I’m so sorry. I will try to be a lot more careful in the future.”
Kyungsoo shrugs, a barely noticeable lift of his slight shoulders, “I’m awake at that time anyway.”
The conversation lulls, Kyungsoo looking away from the Chinese, looking like he was drifting away from reality and into some sort of day-er, night dream and Luhan awkwardly rubbed at his stubble that was beginning to poke through on the bottom his chin.
“I’m an astronomer.”
Blinking rapidly and unsure that he heard correctly, Luhan tuned back into what he thought was a previously dead conversation. “I’m sorry?”
Kyungsoo was focused back on Luhan, now rooted back on Earth. “I’m an astronomer,” he repeated, straight faced.
Rando-oh. That would explain why he was awake at that time.
Luhan voices that thought out loud and a shadow of a smile passes on Kyungsoo’s face like approval and he nods. “I’m an author,” Luhan tries.
“Do most authors hold those hours?”
Luhan laughs. “No, just me. I have difficulty sleeping-insomnia.”
“And that would explain the late hours.”
“Well, yes.”
The conversation rolls on, easy and casual, nothing too probing. They talk about their respective careers, the complex of which they live at (complaining slightly of the rude neighbor who lives above them who has no idea what noise pollution means), and before either Luhan or Kyungsoo realizes it, the park is becoming brighter, Kyungsoo’s clothes not blending in quite away, the park lights flicker off, and the morning bird calls begin, din loud and interrupting their conversation.
Luhan’s nothing close to an introvert, entertaining guests at his occasional publishing party without a second thought. It’s easy to turn on his charm, charisma, as his best friend Minseok wearily says, but with Kyungsoo’s attentive way of looking like the most interesting thing was to sit there and listen to Luhan babble on and how nice his voice sounds (like chocolate melting in your ears, his brain supplies).
When Kyungsoo’s the first to crack, a yawn breaking him off at mid-nod, Luhan laughs, suggesting the two start making their way home since it seemed like it was time for the nocturnals to sleep. The two make their way home, Luhan’s notebook tucked carelessly into a jacket pocket and Kyungsoo’s hands stuck into his pockets, with the Chinese’s chattering as background noise.
They say their goodbyes and a joking good morning before slipping into their own apartments and as Luhan’s washing up, he conjures up a character with a tendency to drift off into his own mind and it’s wide eyes oddly resemble a certain neighbor.
Luhan manages to slip off into sleep today.
“Oh.”
It’s many nights after the first that the two meet again at the park, Luhan deciding to take a few re-routes to help inspire him.
“Good night,” Kyungsoo’s greeting is nothing but warm.
“‘Good night,” Luhan jokingly returns, his pen pausing on the page, a doodle interrupted.
“Lovely moon out tonight,” the smaller makes small talk as he makes his way to Luhan’s bench, the ugly maroon color lighter underneath the pole light.
Luhan nods, “Barely a cloud in the sky.”
“Working on your novel?” Kyungsoo begins, gesturing at the open notebook.
He chuckles, moving his hand and sheepishly revealing his messy Chinese scrawls and doodles that litter the page. “Kind of.”
The right brow lifts along with the right corner. “Kind of, huh.”
The same thing happens like the first night, conversation flowing from which nights are the best, the crisply sharp nights like tonight or those warming spring nights where a few of the night flowers were showing off their young blooms, to Kyungsoo’s favorite constellations that he tries to point out but easily dismisses it saying we’re too deep in Seoul and all the smog covers the night sky. we can’t really see anything from here. if you want to be able to see anything, you have to go about an hour out from the city.
The first night that Luhan brings ttokbokki for two is the same night that Kyungsoo brings a thermos that holds enough hot chocolate for two and they laugh, hands clutching their own respective items.
“We can have our own feast!” Luhan jokes.
Kyungsoo smiles, summoning cups from somewhere in his giant jacket and doles out the hot chocolate. Luhan pretends not to notice that he’s poured more for Luhan than himself but he doesn’t let the opportunity of teasing Kyungsoo for even bringing marshmallows to pop into the sweet drink. Kyungsoo just rolls his eyes but the pink high on his cheeks-Luhan suspects isn’t just from the cold.
“Shut up and drink your hot chocolate,” Kyungsoo gruffly says, shoving the cup into Luhan’s hand, nearly spilling the drink.
He just laughs and Kyungsoo joins in.
(“You know that I’m just laughing at your face when you laugh, right?”)
(“Respect your hyung, Kyungsoo.”)
(Kyungsoo just snorts, stabbing a rice cake to shove into his mouth.)
They don’t meet every night, but often enough, some nights with Luhan looking more haggard than the last, his insomnia coming and going like the waxing and waning moon, the two meet until finally after the first snow falls and Kyungsoo’s shivering a large black coat that covers him from head to toe that Luhan suggests that they camp out in a late night (Kyungsoo gives him a look until he laughs and corrects himself to early morning) coffee shop or something. The smaller is all too happy to agree, hiking up his shoulders until his ears are engulfed by the puff jacket and Luhan laughs at the image.
“What do you usually do?” Luhan asks when they settle in the coffee shop, one they found googling on their phones.
Kyungsoo shoots him a confused look and asks him to be more specific.
“I mean, astronomy. What do you do? Look through telescopes?”
He shrugs, wrapping small fingers around his steaming latte. “Sort of. I specialize in black holes, that’s what my team is currently working on. We gather data, we research, we test theories.”
Leaning in, Luhan’s ears metaphorically perking up. “Like?” he prompts.
“You know we think that black holes are formed when gigantic stars collapse?” Luhan nods. “Giant stars have huge gravitational fields and so when it’s so large that it collapses in itself it essentially sucks it’s old body into itself. Well, we think that the new black hole’s gravitational force is so strong that it’s able to bend light into it.
Some even think time.”
Luhan leans back, his mouth open in a little ‘o’ of awe.
The astronomer chuckles, eyes dropping down to the lip of his cup, thumb absently tracing the edge of the lid. “It’s just really fascinating to me. To some people, checking on photographs that our telescopes send back might seem really boring, but yeah, some nights you get more frustrated because it’s the same thing day after day, but when you do find something it’s just so worth it and truly awe worthy. It’s gorgeous, you know, the galaxy.”
He’s listening but he’s distracted by the light that shines from Kyungsoo’s eyes and the way his mouth moves to explain the physics that go behind capturing the images that can be sent back to earth.
Kyungsoo may work with stars that are billion of light years away, but to Luhan, he’s the brightest star that he can see.
A few days pass by without a peek of Kyungsoo at their usual haunt and Luhan’s not too concerned, just eating the rice cakes silently and watching the dim glow of stars from his bench, but then the days turn to weeks and there’s still not a shadow of the astronomer. By now, the cats gather where Luhan leaves the take out box of leftover, unable to finish the double serving.
It’s the day before Christmas eve that Luhan gets the bright idea of just knocking on his neighbors door. When he reaches this epiphany, he lets his head fall with a loud thunk onto his kitchen counter, unable to really understand how stupid he was. He ignores the nagging voice that told him that if Kyungsoo wanted his company, he could’ve always popped over anytime.
And so, that evening, before the sun even started going down, that Luhan stands in front of the small astronomer’s door, clammy hands wiping nervously down on his nice jeans, the ones that looks like they’ve been washed recently. He wields the box of ttokbokki and a weak smile as an attempt to rekindle their friendship that they built like a matchbox house, stick by stick-of rice cake.
Kyungsoo answers the door by the third knock.
He’s blinking sleep out of his eyes, little hands coming up to rub at his face. The strands and clumps of hair that stick in every direction is tell tale sign enough to Luhan that he had rudely interrupted his neighbor’s nap.
“Hello?” the younger mumbles, half the word being caught on his tongue, lashes fluttering tiredness.
“Er, hello,” Luhan tries, the box of take out box lowering slowly. Alarm bells start blaring loud and incessant in his head and his mind shrieks IF YOU RUN NOW, HE PROBABLY WILL EVENTUALLY THINK THAT IT WAS JUST A DREAM!!!
Kyungsoo takes a deep breath, taking in the scent of the pepper paste sauce and his brow furrows in familiarity. “Ttokbokki?” he murmurs mostly to himself than to his unexpected visitor.
As in response, the hand holding the box, jerks upward, hope blossoming in his chest like a spring flower at the smallest hint of warm weather in the winter. “I brought ttokbokki,” Luhan explains, voice small but heart big and expectant.
His neighbor rubs his brow, eyes crinkling, but smile tugging up the corner of his lips and he invites the awkward one in. “I was just getting hungry,” is all that is Kyungsoo’s comment as he waddles into the kitchen to warm up some water for hot chocolate.
Luhan’s eyes are wandering like a child in an open field and he takes it all in, the same
layout as his apartment, but the actual view of Kyungsoo’s floor is a stark difference from Luhan’s messy apartment. He drinks in the star charts tacked precariously on the wall, but he suspects that are in accurate placement to the night sky, he takes in the familiar jacket hung up on a rack, he blinks at the sweatpants hanging low on Kyungsoo’s hips and gulps to avert his eyes, flush creeping up his neck.
A mug settles in front of Luhan and it breaks him out of his daydreaming.
“Thanks,” he says absently, hands coming up to wrap around the steaming cup.
“Sorry for disappearing on you.”
Luhan blinks at the sudden apology.
“We found something at work and well, it’s something big, we think. It’s basically been consuming my life-”
“That’s what black holes do, right?” Luhan cracks and he giggles at his own word play while Kyungsoo just gives him a strained smile in return. He’s clearly had his fair share of black hole puns.
He swallows, clearing his throat before continuing, acting like the interruption had never happened, but the small smile flirting at the edges of his lips say otherwise, “We’ve gotten more images and we’ve started to notice something. Our telescope collect x-ray light from black holes and dying stars, we call it NuSTAR, short for something else that doesn’t mean anything to you-” Luhan gives a grateful smile.
Authors use a lot of words, but none of that fancy science vocabulary. “and we noticed some light being bent towards the center of the black hole.” Kyungsoo pauses, dragging in a deep breath, eyes dancing with barely suppressed excitement. “A corona-a source of x-ray light that’s pretty close to the black hole that we’ve been monitoring-recently collapsed and that black hole is a lot brighter now that it’s sucked in the corona so it’s easier for us to observe. Our theory, lying on a lot of evidence and a lot of guessing is that this supermassive black hole spins so rapidly that time and space is dragged around with it.”
It’s the most that the author’s ever heard from the astronomer in one sitting. Luhan can see the passion that Kyungsoo has for his field from every pore. The astronomer’s posture is at attention, taut and straight, eyes bright, teeth biting into his lower lip, hands clasped eagerly in front and makes words flow out from Luhan. He writes down the scene in words that just pop up in his mind and he knows that the words won’t be fading from his mind anytime soon. Kyungsoo’s passion is just too riveting to forget.
“Oh wow,” is that first thing out of his mouth, “Wow, that’s-that’s really, really huge.” The smile on Kyungsoo’s face is too.
“Right?” Kyungsoo is breathless.
“You do some really amazing things, Kyungsoo.” Luhan’s feeling the same type of breathless. It makes his breaths short and his heart races, pulled along with how charged the younger is.
His eyes fall to the floor, soft pink dusting his cheeks. “Thank you,” Kyungsoo modestly says.
“Amazing.” Luhan’s not sure if he’s talking about Kyungsoo’s work or something else.
“I want to show you something,” Kyungsoo says, hours later, the box of ttokbokki long eaten, the empty mugs lie in the sink waiting to be washed. There’s a few photographs pulled up on Kyungsoo’s laptop and a lot of words in English that Luhan doesn’t understand littered around his head that had tumbled so eagerly from the other’s mouth that he just couldn’t interrupt the other.
“Hm?”
“I want to show you something,” Kyungsoo repeats, hands clenched in his lap. Alarm flares in Luhan as he takes in the way the smaller’s eyes dart side to side, fists shoved under his legs, and how he almost curls into himself.
Luhan cocks his head to the side, curious. “Ok,” he just simply says.
Wide eyes come up to meet his straight on and his breath catches in his throat. “I want to show you my observatory.”
“Oh.”
Kyungsoo doesn’t blink, eyes searching for an answer in his own.
“Oh, would I be allowed to?”
A smile breaks out on his face, relief fading out to crinkled eyes and a heart. “Yeah. My boss is pretty easy going with things like visitors. I won’t be able to show you anything of the project, but I’ll be able to show you the general rest of the observatory. I want to show you a few constellations and things you can’t see from the Seoul sky.”
Luhan can’t help the smile that reflects back on his face as he answers, ‘I’d love that.”
Kyungsoo’s blinding smile doesn’t fade from his mind for the rest of the night, even when the clock strikes late late late even for them and the astronomer’s yawning, eyes closing in sleep, and small body going lax and Luhan reluctantly bids him a good night.
Kyungsoo sees him out, sleepy wave and a soft murmur of “good night” that Luhan tucks away in the corner of his mind as he falls asleep.
“We can take the bus to the city where my work is and then we’re going to drive to my observatory,” Kyungsoo greets Luhan in a few nights later, early in the evening when he had swung open the door.
“Huh?” Luhan mumbles half-asleep, hands rubbing slowly into his hair.
Kyungsoo’s eyebrow pops up, as he takes in Luhan’s rumpled state.“It’s 8.”
He squints before pulling back to squint at the clock in the kitchen and sure enough, the small numbers read 8. “Oops?” is all Luhan can offer as he stands aside to let his neighbor in. Kyungsoo shakes his head before brushing past the author and plops himself onto Luhan’s couch before gesturing to Luhan’s bathroom. He doesn’t say anything but Luhan gets the gist and he totters off to get himself ready.
He’s back within 20 minutes, freshly showered, shaved, and teeth brushed and there’s a mug of coffee settled on his kitchen counter. “Bless your heart,” Luhan tosses into the living room before adding his desired amount of cream and sugar and stirring the drink idly. He pads to the living room when he doesn’t hear a response.
Kyungsoo’s staring, observing, taking in the few pictures that Luhan has propped up around the space, pictures he had taken before he had come to Seoul. All of them show a younger Luhan laughing, laughing with friends, laughing with family, laughing proudly displaying his first published book. “Quaint,” he comments, seeing Luhan leaning against the wall, sipping at his coffee.
They slip out of the apartment 40 minutes after the time that Luhan had opened the door and they walk to the nearest bus stop, chatting about anything and everything. The sun’s setting and the city’s cooling down but there’s still plenty of people bustling about. Seoul never really sleeps, too busy to take a break.
The 2 hours on the bus passes by quickly enough, lost between soft smiles, pink blushes, accidental shoulder brushes, and the occasional staring before being broken with a quick glance downwards. Kyungsoo thanks the driver as they step off, a familiar answer given and they climb into a small car provided by the observatory. Kyungsoo’s got a steady hand on the wheel, eyes steady on the road and the conversation settles into a comfortable silence that Luhan takes the time to watch the trees whip by outside the window.
The observatory rises from a layer of trees, rising high and white, towering around the surrounding forest. Even though Beijing and Seoul had tall buildings, the height never really seemed all that immense until the only thing that was taller than the trees was the observatory.
“I’m assuming that’s it?” Luhan breaks the silence, voice hushed from the disuse. His volume barely rises above the soft piano music coming from the speakers but Luhan knows that the driver heard. Kyungsoo’s eyes flicker up and to the direction of the place and he nods at the familiar sight.
They arrive at the observatory shortly after 11, the night air cool on their necks and the forest loud around them. Kyungsoo greets the night guards and they ask of Kyungsoo’s friend.
Smiling, Luhan introduces himself and the guards response likewise with equal enthusiasm before Kyungsoo ushers the Chinese into the building.
The building’s dark, lit only by a few lights but it’s well designed, the few spotlights highlighting models and awards while the darker areas house maps of constellations high on the ceiling.
Kyungsoo takes Luhan on a small tour, pointing to certain things while explaining, sentences long and plentiful and it leaves the other in awe of how much the astronomer knows.
“And here, is my favorite place. It’s a little cliche, but I like the planetary the most,” he stops in front of a large door, thick and heavy looking.
It takes a quick input of a password and the door swings open like a sci fi and Luhan says this out loud. The Korean chuckles at his comment before slipping in and tugging his neighbor in as well. It takes a few more button pushing before the door closes behind them and the pair are plunged into darkness.
Eyesight robbed, Luhan can feel his hearing strain and all he can feel is the warmth of Kyungsoo’s hand around his. He licks his suddenly parched lips and curls his toes in his shoes, eyes straining for any bit of light.
“Watch this,” a whisper comes from in front of him and he hears the click of something being flicked on. A machine whirs to life and a soft light glows from the ceiling. One by one the constellations that Kyungsoo had pointed to outside of the planetarium flickers to life.
Kyungsoo leads Luhan to one of the multiple seats laid out and starts pointing out to his favorite ones but honestly, it’s all lost to him when his heart is racing, his hands are sweaty, and his heart feels too jumpy but it’s fades out as he leans forward, catching Kyungsoo mid-sentence with a kiss.
His hands come to wrap behind the smaller’s neck and he can feel that Kyungsoo’s pulse is jackrabbiting just like his own. It seems like Kyungsoo doesn’t really mind, losing the sentence to respond to Luhan’s kiss, nervous hands resting lightly on the other’s shoulders. His mind goes blank, no words popping up in his mind to describe the euphoria he’s riding on.
They break apart, eyes blinking open in shock and in revelation, hands frozen where they are. They’re an inch apart, noses nearly touching but neither wants to back away, to break the spell that’s been casted.
It’s not until Kyungsoo giggles that Luhan chokes on a giggle and then they’re both giggling, the past mood dissipating like popped bubbles, but they collapse on each other, foreheads coming together and eyes never breaking contact.
“I really like you,” Luhan breaths out, his tongue catching on the Korean.
Kyungsoo’s eyes curve upwards and he answers, his voice just as breathless, “Yeah, yeah I noticed. I really like you, too.”
They spend the rest of the night in the planetarium, hands intertwined and heart beats synchronized as Kyungsoo finishes showing all the constellations and Luhan maps out his own constellation in the brightness of his astronomer’s eyes.
For: fopsyche94
Rating: PG
Length: 5055
Summary: Luhan finds that the brightest star isn't in the sky but in Kyungsoo.
Warning(s): I write about black holes.
Author's Note: Thank you, always to my beta J. You always add funny remarks that make me want to delete you and to keep you.
To my recipient, I hope you enjoy this~ I strayed quite a bit from the prompt but this was my take on it. Enjoy ^^
Sighing, Luhan stares at the ceiling of his bedroom, resigned to another night of restlessness. He looks without really looking at the scattered glow-in-the dark stars that Sehun had randomly stuck on the ceiling when he had been over one afternoon, claiming that hyung would at least have something to look at when he can’t sleep. They glow a soft green and it’s a familiar sight, many nights spent just looking.
He reaches over to his phone, clicking the home button to watch the screen light up. The clock reads 2:34 and that means that he’s been lying in bed for over 2 hours and that he’s been awake for over 16 hours. Exhaustion hasn’t quite set in yet; luckily, Luhan had been able to drift off to sleep yesterday, meaning that he probably wouldn’t be able to sleep until tomorrow night anyway.
Kicking off his comforter, he unplugs his phone from the charger and reaching blindly for his pants at the foot of the bed. With a practiced ease, he tugs them on and strolls out of his room, automatically snagging a jacket hung over the back of his chair. October was strolling in withnights becoming more and more chilly.
Luhan debates on turning on the lights to grab something to munch on but he decides to just snag something from one of the late night stands. He treads quietly through his dark apartment, everything already committed to memory. Jiggling the key into the lock to make sure the door’s locked, Luhan slips out of his place, jacket snug around his shoulders.
Wandering out into Seoul’s night, Luhan slid his hands into his jacket pockets, the fall air unforgiving. The few straggling cars meander by, the occasional drunk staggers by, and Luhan just walks, going in no particular direction.
He makes a quick stop to his usual ttukbokki place, greeting the kind ahjumma with a polite hello. She’s glad to see him, fussing how it’s so late and if a young man like him is out this late it would ruin his skin. He just chuckles, thankful for her small worries before handing over change to pay for the steaming bag that she hands over. They exchange small pleasantries, she asking how his writing’s been and he asking how her son has been. He eventually leaves, assuring her that he’ll try to come when it’s not quite so late.
Continuing on, he comes to his usual haunt, a small park near his place, fully equipped with multiple benches and soft streetlights to adequately light up the place. It’s always quiet, the wind rustling here and there but nothing really happens. Luhan had stumbled upon the little park hidden behind a large line of trees a few months back and since then, he constantly came at night when he just couldn’t fall asleep.
Coming to a bench directly beneath a street lamp, he cautiously opens his ttokbokki and notebook, scattering pens across the cool surface. Luhan makes do of the late night snack quickly, blowing on the steaming rice cakes, careful to not let the sauce drip onto paper.
He munches quietly, letting his mind wander. Luhan’s always loved nighttime; quieter, darker, and full of potential.
The Chinese man jots down a few notes of what he plans to do with his current novel, something that’s just barely taken off, more of just an idea. Luhan doesn’t have much beyond the background of the story and the gist of what he wants to write but he doesn’t worry, the idea will come to him eventually.
Footsteps distract him away from the inked words and Luhan looks up, toothpicks dangling out from his mouth.
A small figure walks into the park and who ever it is, freezes when they spot Luhan. The two aren’t sure what to make of the other and silence stretches.
Steam billows out from Luhan’s mouth and finally the figure moves. They take a glance back at Luhan before turning away to settle one of the benches furthest from Luhan.
He’s not quite sure what to make of the newcomer but unease sit under his stomach.
The person is not large, smaller than Luhan, but they’re draped in a large coat, black fabric from head to toe.
But neither Luhan nor the stranger say anything to each other, nor does the other move very much. Luhan eventually gets back to his notebook, keeping an eye on the other and the darkly dressed man just sips from a can and gazes upwards at the sky.
Time stretches on and Luhan ties up the remaining ttukbokki sauce. He sees the figure flinch in the corner of his eye but now the stranger is just observing him, not moving. Luhan cleans up his things, tucking the notebook into an inner pocket and makes his way out of the park, wondering why the stranger was there.
But as soon as Luhan steps foot back into his apartment, light creeping in through his windows, he shucks off his shoes and tosses his trash, filling the kettle with water for his morning cup of tea, and the odd stranger is quickly forgotten, lost in the murkiness of night.
It happens again, once, twice, thrice, the black cloaked man and him meeting at the park and neither Luhan nor the stranger make a move to say anything. It isn’t until the 6th time that someone pipes up.
“Are you stalking me?”
Luhan jerks, his pencil skiddling across the page and leaving a dark line.
“What?”
The stranger’s voice is unexpectedly young and warm. He repeats, “Are you stalking me?”
Luhan slowly turns to the stranger. Maybe his Korean isn’t that good but he’s pretty sure that the man had just asked if he was the one stalking the other man.
Closing his notebook, Luhan says slowly, “No, I’ve been coming to this park for months.”
The man steps closer and into a pool of light and the Chinese man realizes exactly how small the man is, his shoulders narrower than Luhan’s and the black makes him almost blend into the night. When Luhan manages to get a good look at his face, he squints. There’s something in the stranger’s face that looks oddly familiar and he can’t quite put his finger on it.
“Do I...know you from somewhere?” Luhan murmurs, not really expecting an answer but there’s a wry smile twisting at the man’s face.
“That sounds like a cheesy pickup line but you do happen to know me from somewhere,” the man says, stepping slower until he’s only a few meters away from Luhan, “we live in the same building. I’m live in apartment 445.”
This lights a bulb in Luhan’s brain and he finally stops squinting at the man, a small ah coming out. 445. He lives in 446. “So...you’re my neighbor then.”
“Yes, I would be. Do Kyungsoo, the one who’s lived in 445 for 6 months,” the man - Kyungsoo introduces and there’s a small smile tugging up the corners of his lips.
Luhan hastily inlines his head, returning Kyungsoo’s introduction with his own,
“Ah, Lu Han of 446.” He hesitates before tacking on, “I’m sorry that I haven’t taken time to introduce myself properly to my neighbors.”
Kyungsoo waves away his apology with a small gesture and takes a seat opposite to Luhan at his harried gesture for him to sit down. “No matter, we hold different hours from mostresidents.”
Luhan nods, accepting it before it really processes and he pauses, “Excuse me, but we”
There’s large owl-like eyes that come back from glancing at his open notebook to fixing themselves on Luhan’s eyes. With strong eyebrows and a softly sloping nose, the wide eyes would seem to soften Kyungsoo’s features, but they not only do they add an air of innocence to the baby faced man but make it appear that Kyungsoo was able to see everything. It made Luhan squirm slightly, but Kyungsoo didn’t seem to notice continuing, “Pardon me, but you seem to be most active in the late evening and night. I don’t see you often out during daylight.”
It appears that his neighbor is observant and it makes alarm bells ring in Luhan’s brain. “Um, how...might you know?” He hopes that his little scoots aren’t noticeable, but with Kyungsoo’s eyes, he probably did notice.
“You leave nearly every night at sometime between 2-3.”
“Oh.” Luhan blinked. “H-how do you…?”
Blinking for what seemed like the first time since the conversation started, Kyungsoo simply stated, “You make a lot more noise than you seem to be aware of, Luhan-sshi.”
He could feel the heat creep from his neck to his face, knowing that the blotch would spread unevenly and unattractively. Luhan coughs into the crook of his arm in an attempt to hide the flush. “Oh, I’m so sorry. I will try to be a lot more careful in the future.”
Kyungsoo shrugs, a barely noticeable lift of his slight shoulders, “I’m awake at that time anyway.”
The conversation lulls, Kyungsoo looking away from the Chinese, looking like he was drifting away from reality and into some sort of day-er, night dream and Luhan awkwardly rubbed at his stubble that was beginning to poke through on the bottom his chin.
“I’m an astronomer.”
Blinking rapidly and unsure that he heard correctly, Luhan tuned back into what he thought was a previously dead conversation. “I’m sorry?”
Kyungsoo was focused back on Luhan, now rooted back on Earth. “I’m an astronomer,” he repeated, straight faced.
Rando-oh. That would explain why he was awake at that time.
Luhan voices that thought out loud and a shadow of a smile passes on Kyungsoo’s face like approval and he nods. “I’m an author,” Luhan tries.
“Do most authors hold those hours?”
Luhan laughs. “No, just me. I have difficulty sleeping-insomnia.”
“And that would explain the late hours.”
“Well, yes.”
The conversation rolls on, easy and casual, nothing too probing. They talk about their respective careers, the complex of which they live at (complaining slightly of the rude neighbor who lives above them who has no idea what noise pollution means), and before either Luhan or Kyungsoo realizes it, the park is becoming brighter, Kyungsoo’s clothes not blending in quite away, the park lights flicker off, and the morning bird calls begin, din loud and interrupting their conversation.
Luhan’s nothing close to an introvert, entertaining guests at his occasional publishing party without a second thought. It’s easy to turn on his charm, charisma, as his best friend Minseok wearily says, but with Kyungsoo’s attentive way of looking like the most interesting thing was to sit there and listen to Luhan babble on and how nice his voice sounds (like chocolate melting in your ears, his brain supplies).
When Kyungsoo’s the first to crack, a yawn breaking him off at mid-nod, Luhan laughs, suggesting the two start making their way home since it seemed like it was time for the nocturnals to sleep. The two make their way home, Luhan’s notebook tucked carelessly into a jacket pocket and Kyungsoo’s hands stuck into his pockets, with the Chinese’s chattering as background noise.
They say their goodbyes and a joking good morning before slipping into their own apartments and as Luhan’s washing up, he conjures up a character with a tendency to drift off into his own mind and it’s wide eyes oddly resemble a certain neighbor.
Luhan manages to slip off into sleep today.
“Oh.”
It’s many nights after the first that the two meet again at the park, Luhan deciding to take a few re-routes to help inspire him.
“Good night,” Kyungsoo’s greeting is nothing but warm.
“‘Good night,” Luhan jokingly returns, his pen pausing on the page, a doodle interrupted.
“Lovely moon out tonight,” the smaller makes small talk as he makes his way to Luhan’s bench, the ugly maroon color lighter underneath the pole light.
Luhan nods, “Barely a cloud in the sky.”
“Working on your novel?” Kyungsoo begins, gesturing at the open notebook.
He chuckles, moving his hand and sheepishly revealing his messy Chinese scrawls and doodles that litter the page. “Kind of.”
The right brow lifts along with the right corner. “Kind of, huh.”
The same thing happens like the first night, conversation flowing from which nights are the best, the crisply sharp nights like tonight or those warming spring nights where a few of the night flowers were showing off their young blooms, to Kyungsoo’s favorite constellations that he tries to point out but easily dismisses it saying we’re too deep in Seoul and all the smog covers the night sky. we can’t really see anything from here. if you want to be able to see anything, you have to go about an hour out from the city.
The first night that Luhan brings ttokbokki for two is the same night that Kyungsoo brings a thermos that holds enough hot chocolate for two and they laugh, hands clutching their own respective items.
“We can have our own feast!” Luhan jokes.
Kyungsoo smiles, summoning cups from somewhere in his giant jacket and doles out the hot chocolate. Luhan pretends not to notice that he’s poured more for Luhan than himself but he doesn’t let the opportunity of teasing Kyungsoo for even bringing marshmallows to pop into the sweet drink. Kyungsoo just rolls his eyes but the pink high on his cheeks-Luhan suspects isn’t just from the cold.
“Shut up and drink your hot chocolate,” Kyungsoo gruffly says, shoving the cup into Luhan’s hand, nearly spilling the drink.
He just laughs and Kyungsoo joins in.
(“You know that I’m just laughing at your face when you laugh, right?”)
(“Respect your hyung, Kyungsoo.”)
(Kyungsoo just snorts, stabbing a rice cake to shove into his mouth.)
They don’t meet every night, but often enough, some nights with Luhan looking more haggard than the last, his insomnia coming and going like the waxing and waning moon, the two meet until finally after the first snow falls and Kyungsoo’s shivering a large black coat that covers him from head to toe that Luhan suggests that they camp out in a late night (Kyungsoo gives him a look until he laughs and corrects himself to early morning) coffee shop or something. The smaller is all too happy to agree, hiking up his shoulders until his ears are engulfed by the puff jacket and Luhan laughs at the image.
“What do you usually do?” Luhan asks when they settle in the coffee shop, one they found googling on their phones.
Kyungsoo shoots him a confused look and asks him to be more specific.
“I mean, astronomy. What do you do? Look through telescopes?”
He shrugs, wrapping small fingers around his steaming latte. “Sort of. I specialize in black holes, that’s what my team is currently working on. We gather data, we research, we test theories.”
Leaning in, Luhan’s ears metaphorically perking up. “Like?” he prompts.
“You know we think that black holes are formed when gigantic stars collapse?” Luhan nods. “Giant stars have huge gravitational fields and so when it’s so large that it collapses in itself it essentially sucks it’s old body into itself. Well, we think that the new black hole’s gravitational force is so strong that it’s able to bend light into it.
Some even think time.”
Luhan leans back, his mouth open in a little ‘o’ of awe.
The astronomer chuckles, eyes dropping down to the lip of his cup, thumb absently tracing the edge of the lid. “It’s just really fascinating to me. To some people, checking on photographs that our telescopes send back might seem really boring, but yeah, some nights you get more frustrated because it’s the same thing day after day, but when you do find something it’s just so worth it and truly awe worthy. It’s gorgeous, you know, the galaxy.”
He’s listening but he’s distracted by the light that shines from Kyungsoo’s eyes and the way his mouth moves to explain the physics that go behind capturing the images that can be sent back to earth.
Kyungsoo may work with stars that are billion of light years away, but to Luhan, he’s the brightest star that he can see.
A few days pass by without a peek of Kyungsoo at their usual haunt and Luhan’s not too concerned, just eating the rice cakes silently and watching the dim glow of stars from his bench, but then the days turn to weeks and there’s still not a shadow of the astronomer. By now, the cats gather where Luhan leaves the take out box of leftover, unable to finish the double serving.
It’s the day before Christmas eve that Luhan gets the bright idea of just knocking on his neighbors door. When he reaches this epiphany, he lets his head fall with a loud thunk onto his kitchen counter, unable to really understand how stupid he was. He ignores the nagging voice that told him that if Kyungsoo wanted his company, he could’ve always popped over anytime.
And so, that evening, before the sun even started going down, that Luhan stands in front of the small astronomer’s door, clammy hands wiping nervously down on his nice jeans, the ones that looks like they’ve been washed recently. He wields the box of ttokbokki and a weak smile as an attempt to rekindle their friendship that they built like a matchbox house, stick by stick-of rice cake.
Kyungsoo answers the door by the third knock.
He’s blinking sleep out of his eyes, little hands coming up to rub at his face. The strands and clumps of hair that stick in every direction is tell tale sign enough to Luhan that he had rudely interrupted his neighbor’s nap.
“Hello?” the younger mumbles, half the word being caught on his tongue, lashes fluttering tiredness.
“Er, hello,” Luhan tries, the box of take out box lowering slowly. Alarm bells start blaring loud and incessant in his head and his mind shrieks IF YOU RUN NOW, HE PROBABLY WILL EVENTUALLY THINK THAT IT WAS JUST A DREAM!!!
Kyungsoo takes a deep breath, taking in the scent of the pepper paste sauce and his brow furrows in familiarity. “Ttokbokki?” he murmurs mostly to himself than to his unexpected visitor.
As in response, the hand holding the box, jerks upward, hope blossoming in his chest like a spring flower at the smallest hint of warm weather in the winter. “I brought ttokbokki,” Luhan explains, voice small but heart big and expectant.
His neighbor rubs his brow, eyes crinkling, but smile tugging up the corner of his lips and he invites the awkward one in. “I was just getting hungry,” is all that is Kyungsoo’s comment as he waddles into the kitchen to warm up some water for hot chocolate.
Luhan’s eyes are wandering like a child in an open field and he takes it all in, the same
layout as his apartment, but the actual view of Kyungsoo’s floor is a stark difference from Luhan’s messy apartment. He drinks in the star charts tacked precariously on the wall, but he suspects that are in accurate placement to the night sky, he takes in the familiar jacket hung up on a rack, he blinks at the sweatpants hanging low on Kyungsoo’s hips and gulps to avert his eyes, flush creeping up his neck.
A mug settles in front of Luhan and it breaks him out of his daydreaming.
“Thanks,” he says absently, hands coming up to wrap around the steaming cup.
“Sorry for disappearing on you.”
Luhan blinks at the sudden apology.
“We found something at work and well, it’s something big, we think. It’s basically been consuming my life-”
“That’s what black holes do, right?” Luhan cracks and he giggles at his own word play while Kyungsoo just gives him a strained smile in return. He’s clearly had his fair share of black hole puns.
He swallows, clearing his throat before continuing, acting like the interruption had never happened, but the small smile flirting at the edges of his lips say otherwise, “We’ve gotten more images and we’ve started to notice something. Our telescope collect x-ray light from black holes and dying stars, we call it NuSTAR, short for something else that doesn’t mean anything to you-” Luhan gives a grateful smile.
Authors use a lot of words, but none of that fancy science vocabulary. “and we noticed some light being bent towards the center of the black hole.” Kyungsoo pauses, dragging in a deep breath, eyes dancing with barely suppressed excitement. “A corona-a source of x-ray light that’s pretty close to the black hole that we’ve been monitoring-recently collapsed and that black hole is a lot brighter now that it’s sucked in the corona so it’s easier for us to observe. Our theory, lying on a lot of evidence and a lot of guessing is that this supermassive black hole spins so rapidly that time and space is dragged around with it.”
It’s the most that the author’s ever heard from the astronomer in one sitting. Luhan can see the passion that Kyungsoo has for his field from every pore. The astronomer’s posture is at attention, taut and straight, eyes bright, teeth biting into his lower lip, hands clasped eagerly in front and makes words flow out from Luhan. He writes down the scene in words that just pop up in his mind and he knows that the words won’t be fading from his mind anytime soon. Kyungsoo’s passion is just too riveting to forget.
“Oh wow,” is that first thing out of his mouth, “Wow, that’s-that’s really, really huge.” The smile on Kyungsoo’s face is too.
“Right?” Kyungsoo is breathless.
“You do some really amazing things, Kyungsoo.” Luhan’s feeling the same type of breathless. It makes his breaths short and his heart races, pulled along with how charged the younger is.
His eyes fall to the floor, soft pink dusting his cheeks. “Thank you,” Kyungsoo modestly says.
“Amazing.” Luhan’s not sure if he’s talking about Kyungsoo’s work or something else.
“I want to show you something,” Kyungsoo says, hours later, the box of ttokbokki long eaten, the empty mugs lie in the sink waiting to be washed. There’s a few photographs pulled up on Kyungsoo’s laptop and a lot of words in English that Luhan doesn’t understand littered around his head that had tumbled so eagerly from the other’s mouth that he just couldn’t interrupt the other.
“Hm?”
“I want to show you something,” Kyungsoo repeats, hands clenched in his lap. Alarm flares in Luhan as he takes in the way the smaller’s eyes dart side to side, fists shoved under his legs, and how he almost curls into himself.
Luhan cocks his head to the side, curious. “Ok,” he just simply says.
Wide eyes come up to meet his straight on and his breath catches in his throat. “I want to show you my observatory.”
“Oh.”
Kyungsoo doesn’t blink, eyes searching for an answer in his own.
“Oh, would I be allowed to?”
A smile breaks out on his face, relief fading out to crinkled eyes and a heart. “Yeah. My boss is pretty easy going with things like visitors. I won’t be able to show you anything of the project, but I’ll be able to show you the general rest of the observatory. I want to show you a few constellations and things you can’t see from the Seoul sky.”
Luhan can’t help the smile that reflects back on his face as he answers, ‘I’d love that.”
Kyungsoo’s blinding smile doesn’t fade from his mind for the rest of the night, even when the clock strikes late late late even for them and the astronomer’s yawning, eyes closing in sleep, and small body going lax and Luhan reluctantly bids him a good night.
Kyungsoo sees him out, sleepy wave and a soft murmur of “good night” that Luhan tucks away in the corner of his mind as he falls asleep.
“We can take the bus to the city where my work is and then we’re going to drive to my observatory,” Kyungsoo greets Luhan in a few nights later, early in the evening when he had swung open the door.
“Huh?” Luhan mumbles half-asleep, hands rubbing slowly into his hair.
Kyungsoo’s eyebrow pops up, as he takes in Luhan’s rumpled state.“It’s 8.”
He squints before pulling back to squint at the clock in the kitchen and sure enough, the small numbers read 8. “Oops?” is all Luhan can offer as he stands aside to let his neighbor in. Kyungsoo shakes his head before brushing past the author and plops himself onto Luhan’s couch before gesturing to Luhan’s bathroom. He doesn’t say anything but Luhan gets the gist and he totters off to get himself ready.
He’s back within 20 minutes, freshly showered, shaved, and teeth brushed and there’s a mug of coffee settled on his kitchen counter. “Bless your heart,” Luhan tosses into the living room before adding his desired amount of cream and sugar and stirring the drink idly. He pads to the living room when he doesn’t hear a response.
Kyungsoo’s staring, observing, taking in the few pictures that Luhan has propped up around the space, pictures he had taken before he had come to Seoul. All of them show a younger Luhan laughing, laughing with friends, laughing with family, laughing proudly displaying his first published book. “Quaint,” he comments, seeing Luhan leaning against the wall, sipping at his coffee.
They slip out of the apartment 40 minutes after the time that Luhan had opened the door and they walk to the nearest bus stop, chatting about anything and everything. The sun’s setting and the city’s cooling down but there’s still plenty of people bustling about. Seoul never really sleeps, too busy to take a break.
The 2 hours on the bus passes by quickly enough, lost between soft smiles, pink blushes, accidental shoulder brushes, and the occasional staring before being broken with a quick glance downwards. Kyungsoo thanks the driver as they step off, a familiar answer given and they climb into a small car provided by the observatory. Kyungsoo’s got a steady hand on the wheel, eyes steady on the road and the conversation settles into a comfortable silence that Luhan takes the time to watch the trees whip by outside the window.
The observatory rises from a layer of trees, rising high and white, towering around the surrounding forest. Even though Beijing and Seoul had tall buildings, the height never really seemed all that immense until the only thing that was taller than the trees was the observatory.
“I’m assuming that’s it?” Luhan breaks the silence, voice hushed from the disuse. His volume barely rises above the soft piano music coming from the speakers but Luhan knows that the driver heard. Kyungsoo’s eyes flicker up and to the direction of the place and he nods at the familiar sight.
They arrive at the observatory shortly after 11, the night air cool on their necks and the forest loud around them. Kyungsoo greets the night guards and they ask of Kyungsoo’s friend.
Smiling, Luhan introduces himself and the guards response likewise with equal enthusiasm before Kyungsoo ushers the Chinese into the building.
The building’s dark, lit only by a few lights but it’s well designed, the few spotlights highlighting models and awards while the darker areas house maps of constellations high on the ceiling.
Kyungsoo takes Luhan on a small tour, pointing to certain things while explaining, sentences long and plentiful and it leaves the other in awe of how much the astronomer knows.
“And here, is my favorite place. It’s a little cliche, but I like the planetary the most,” he stops in front of a large door, thick and heavy looking.
It takes a quick input of a password and the door swings open like a sci fi and Luhan says this out loud. The Korean chuckles at his comment before slipping in and tugging his neighbor in as well. It takes a few more button pushing before the door closes behind them and the pair are plunged into darkness.
Eyesight robbed, Luhan can feel his hearing strain and all he can feel is the warmth of Kyungsoo’s hand around his. He licks his suddenly parched lips and curls his toes in his shoes, eyes straining for any bit of light.
“Watch this,” a whisper comes from in front of him and he hears the click of something being flicked on. A machine whirs to life and a soft light glows from the ceiling. One by one the constellations that Kyungsoo had pointed to outside of the planetarium flickers to life.
Kyungsoo leads Luhan to one of the multiple seats laid out and starts pointing out to his favorite ones but honestly, it’s all lost to him when his heart is racing, his hands are sweaty, and his heart feels too jumpy but it’s fades out as he leans forward, catching Kyungsoo mid-sentence with a kiss.
His hands come to wrap behind the smaller’s neck and he can feel that Kyungsoo’s pulse is jackrabbiting just like his own. It seems like Kyungsoo doesn’t really mind, losing the sentence to respond to Luhan’s kiss, nervous hands resting lightly on the other’s shoulders. His mind goes blank, no words popping up in his mind to describe the euphoria he’s riding on.
They break apart, eyes blinking open in shock and in revelation, hands frozen where they are. They’re an inch apart, noses nearly touching but neither wants to back away, to break the spell that’s been casted.
It’s not until Kyungsoo giggles that Luhan chokes on a giggle and then they’re both giggling, the past mood dissipating like popped bubbles, but they collapse on each other, foreheads coming together and eyes never breaking contact.
“I really like you,” Luhan breaths out, his tongue catching on the Korean.
Kyungsoo’s eyes curve upwards and he answers, his voice just as breathless, “Yeah, yeah I noticed. I really like you, too.”
They spend the rest of the night in the planetarium, hands intertwined and heart beats synchronized as Kyungsoo finishes showing all the constellations and Luhan maps out his own constellation in the brightness of his astronomer’s eyes.