Charm Me (but don’t play tricks on me) for natsudive 2/3
Kyungsoo takes the test at 9 in the morning the next day, after waking up all groggily and having to survive the day with two cups of hot Americano, and gets it back at 3 in the afternoon because their teacher was too free. Kyungsoo buries his head into his palms as he stares at the test paper, flipped around so he can’t see the marks (he asked Minseok to do that) and he lets out a weak whine when Minseok gets an A. They struggle for two minutes straight before Minseok slaps Kyungsoo’s hands away and grabs the paper to look at it himself. Kyungsoo gulps.
He’d passed the test, albeit meagerly; and apparently Chanyeol had aced it. Kyungsoo groans. He must’ve studied before he went down last night, and Kyungsoo was simply wasting his precious time watching fucking fires and roses. He sniffs quietly and Minseok does that hair-patting thing that makes him feel better in a matter of seconds.
-
“I want to learn it entirely,” is all Kyungsoo says, breathless, when he meets Chanyeol at the rooftop. Chanyeol had skipped lit lecture, and Kyungsoo took off after him (it was hard, chasing after people who have long legs when you have short ones is such a torture). Chanyeol stares at him, incredulous, and his eyes ask why, even though he doesn’t speak. “Magic,” Kyungsoo continues. “Teach me more.”
-
Magic is when Kyungsoo lies awake in Chanyeol’s bed at 2 in the night, one side of his earphones plugged into his ear as the other one is seated in Chanyeol’s ear after a long day of school; magic is when fall comes to a close and winter manages to sweep Kyungsoo off his feet when Chanyeol promises him a snowman that looks like him (and he did it); magic is when Chanyeol leans in a little too close and when their eyes meet Kyungsoo can feel his cheeks burn and he sees the pink tint on Chanyeol’s cheeks, when they skip classes together to lie on the rooftop of the buildings and tell each other what the clouds look like.
-
“Let me bring you somewhere,” Chanyeol says excitedly, hand already tugging on Kyungsoo’s wrist although Kyungsoo hadn’t promised him to. He had barged in without even knocking, and it’s already evening. Jongin looks on with an amused expression from his table and Kyungsoo quietly sets his pencil down.
“I have a bio test tomorrow-”
“You’ll do fine,” Chanyeol interjects. “Sehun tells me you’re pretty fucking smart and he’d like to be like you everyday. Come with me!”
If there was a thing that Kyungsoo wasn’t good at, aside from writing half-assed Literature essays on Victorianism and the change of the concept of romance from the 19th century till now, it would be rejecting Chanyeol. He lets out a resigned sigh and waves at Jongin when Chanyeol drags them out after grabbing the subway pass from Kyungsoo’s desk. He even knows where Kyungsoo kept it, this brat.
-
They end up on a train towards Hongdae, or so Chanyeol claims. The cityscape and the occasional farmland of Seoul whirl past Kyungsoo’s eyes from outside of the window and he has to blink his giddiness away after some staring.
-
Kyungsoo has been here, once or twice, and Hongdae looks exactly like how he had remembered and pictured it to be. Low string lights hanging off short trees and lamp posts and street food stalls who blast pop music at maximum volume, girls in stylish clothes and high boots and boys who look pleasantly buzzed and wasted. “Why are we here?” Kyungsoo asks, but in the crowd, Chanyeol can’t hear him.
“Why are we here?” Kyungsoo yells, and Chanyeol leans down to his ear to answer. Kyungsoo most definitely does not shiver at that.
“To show you what magic is like, a level above me,” Chanyeol had whispered, before tugging them out of the crowd gathering at the atrium and into seemingly an alley. They cut through the alley and end up at a three-storey building with neon signs all over and above the front glass doors.
“I’m - we’re underage,” Kyungsoo splutters.
Chanyeol hushes him with a wink. “You don’t have to be legal to watch their magic shows. Come on!”
Kyungsoo averts his eyes nervously when they pass the bouncer (he’s not a bouncer, Chanyeol had said, there’s more than just a pub here, Kyungsoo) - doorman, whatever, but Chanyeol’s not lying and they’re let in without any age confirmation or those things he’d seen on TV and read in books.
The music playing in the lobby surprises Kyungsoo. It’s entirely different from what Kyungsoo expected would be playing in a bar (god damned stereotypes), and it isn’t any flashy pop tunes but classical music. Violins, pianos, French horns. Things like that.
“Told you,” Chanyeol says with a smile, “this place is special. The club is upstairs and they have a performance hall here, which brings me to why I brought you here. There’s a world-class performer in there today, and you said you wanted to learn.”
Kyungsoo doesn’t get the chance to reply before Chanyeol’s grabbing his wrist again, whisking them pass people and plopping down on one of the cushiony seats in the hall. “Don’t we have to pay, though?” Kyungsoo squeaks, suddenly intimidated by the atmosphere surrounding them. People are dressed up to the nines, hair done and the ladies even have glitter on their hair and Kyungsoo feels extremely off in a t-shirt and ripped jeans.
“Yeah,” Chanyeol replies, eyes trained on the dark stage. “After this.”
-
It turns out that by Chanyeol’s ‘after this’, he means not anytime now, not anytime at all. They run out of the hall after the show ended, shuffling in between people until they’re out of the place, unscathed.
“That was amazing,” Kyungsoo breathes as they halt to a stop near the train station. It’s a little sad, but he doesn’t want to go back so quickly, although he doesn’t want to go back to that place again.
“The show or the running?” Chanyeol laughs, “Anyway, we should come here next time - on another day of the week because their workers work shifts like that. Their club upstairs is where all the magicians mingle, I go there sometimes, to watch and learn.”
That’s a promise to return, Kyungsoo thinks.
They take the second-last train back to their school and today Kyungsoo says good bye and walks away first before he can see the apprehensive look on Chanyeol’s face as he bites his lip, retracts his stretched arm and walks away in the other direction, throwing a sad glance across his shoulder at Kyungsoo’s back.
-
“Sehun,” Kyungsoo mutters one day, the side of his face heavy against the thick stack of notes on enzymes and biological catalysts, “Sehun, I can’t pay attention at all. What is happening to me?”
“Option one, you’re being complacent about your work, which is highly impossible; option two, you’re sick, which you don’t seem to be, and option three,” Sehun leans in close to whisper, eyes bright, “you’re in love. Spit it, who’s the lucky guy? Does he take bio? Is he in our class? Because you could totally help him with his studies, lucky guy.”
Kyungsoo closes his eyes and sighs. He doesn’t know what’s going on, but it’s neither of the first two options, which leaves him with the third. Now, Kyungsoo doesn’t know if this is infatuation or love, or if he even likes Chanyeol at all. It’s confusing. Chanyeol holds his hands like he’s born to do it and although Kyungsoo pretends he didn’t, he always sees the faint tint of pink on Chanyeol’s cheeks when Kyungsoo leans in too close. What are they?
“I’m… I don’t know, Sehun,” Kyungsoo moans, closing the notes over his head, “it’s so confusing, I’m so confused, I want to walk into a wall and die.”
“Are you okay?” Sehun says, voice dropped to a whisper because their teacher’s sharp eyes are all over them now. “You’re not sick, right?”
“I’m not,” Kyungsoo mumbles.
“Maybe you’re lovesick.”
“Maybe you’ll flunk your next test,” Kyungsoo snaps sadly.
Sehun hisses and shifts his body so that all Kyungsoo can see is the side of Sehun’s head and his left shoulder. He doesn’t reply, just continues scribbling onto his notes angrily and when the bell rings, Sehun doesn’t look at Kyungsoo until Kyungsoo tugs at the hem of his shirt pitifully. “I’m sorry,” Kyungsoo says, “I don’t know what’s going on in me.”
“I understood that part,” Sehun says with a roll of his eyes. “Come on, we’re going to be late for the lunch queue.”
-
Kyungsoo finds that he has no appetite, even when Sehun sets a hot plate of macaroni and cheese in his face. Sehun clicks his tongue. “I still think you’re in love,” he says.
“Falling in love makes you lose your appetite?” Kyungsoo says weakly, staring at the food with no intention of touching it at all.
“Makes you distracted enough to not want to eat and do other things,” Sehun says between mouthfuls of kimchi fried rice, “I almost majored in psychology, you can trust me.”
“Ha, trust you-”
“Sehun! Kyungsoo!” There’s suddenly a heavy weight on Kyungsoo’s shoulders and he looks up to see Chanyeol, grin bright and hair orange (it’s become lighter than when Kyungsoo first saw him). “Oh my god, I’m so hungry.”
“Take his lunch,” Sehun says curtly, eyeing Kyungsoo purposefully. “He says he has no appetite.”
“What?” Chanyeol asks, “Why? Are you okay, Kyungsoo? Feeling unwell anywhere?”
Kyungsoo’s feeling so very unwell. His stomach is churning and flittering and are those fucking butterflies in him? His head is spinning at the sight of Chanyeol and his palms are already sweaty with nerves. “I’m totally fine,” he says instead, and watches as the worry between Chanyeol’s brows dissipate. “Don’t worry about me.”
Sehun’s frown appears again, but he says nothing to Chanyeol, although his fierce gaze stays on Kyungsoo for the whole of the lunch break.
“We’re going to be late for lab, shit, Sehun, let’s go,” Kyungsoo says, staring at the digital clock in the cafeteria.
-
They’re early for lab. Sehun sighs softly and looks at Kyungsoo silently.
“I didn’t want more people to worry about me, that’s all,” Kyungsoo mutters.
“Great, you even know what I’m going to ask even before I ask it. Is this a sign of us being soulmates or something?”
“I’m sorry,” Kyungsoo just says.
“You’re apologizing too much today,” Sehun whispers back. “You’re weird today. Something is wrong. I’m sticking to my theory that you have fallen in love.”
The teacher walks in and they don’t anymore because it’s an individual assessment. Kyungsoo momentarily forgets about his nerves and when the class ends, he’s latched onto Sehun’s side, demanding that they get a sandwich before going to their next class.
Sehun rolls his eyes, but helps Kyungsoo get a tuna sandwich.
“You know,” Sehun says, gaze fixed on Kyungsoo as Kyungsoo eats quietly. “Chanyeol doesn’t talk to me about these things, so I wouldn’t know how he thinks, so you can stop staring at me all the time.”
“I didn’t - what - what about Chanyeol? What has anything got to do with Chanyeol?” Kyungsoo splutters, lettuce lodged in his throat uncomfortably.
“What has anything got to do with me?”
Kyungsoo chokes on the vegetable and his eyes are large when he turns to see Chanyeol. Sehun purses his lips. “Nothing,” he says.
“Wow, Kyungsoo, you look like hell. Are you sure you’re okay?” Chanyeol asks with a stack of textbooks still in his arms.
“Nothing a good sandwich can’t fix,” Sehun replies with a wide grin. “Aren’t you supposed to go somewhere?”
Chanyeol perks up and runs off with a quick bye in their direction.
“You are so doomed, Do Kyungsoo,” Sehun sighs, picking the sandwich from Kyungsoo’s fingers to take a bite.
“Nothing a good sandwich can’t fix,” Kyungsoo mumbles. Sehun sends him an incredulous glare.
-
It seems to Kyungsoo that the more he avoids Chanyeol, the more Chanyeol comes to look for him. Chanyeol’d pestered him for four days straight after then, insisting that Kyungsoo, you should go to the doctor if you’re not feeling well and don’t lie to me, tell me if you’re really unwell, okay? Jongin had widened his eyes in surprise when Kyungsoo dived into his blankets and told Jongin to pretend Kyungsoo wasn’t here when Chanyeol came over and knocked on the door for fifteen minutes before leaving.
“What are you,” Jongin pauses, “doing? It isn’t like you to avoid Chanyeol, you know.”
“I’m so confused I want to die,” Kyungsoo whines, voice muffled by his blanket, “Sehun says I’m in love but I don’t even know if I am, I mean, I’m not seeing fireworks or stars when I see Chanyeol but there are butterflies in my stomach? Are they even butterflies? Am I suffering from indigestion?”
“Indigestion makes you fart,” Jongin says.
“You’re not paying attention in class,” Kyungsoo whimpers.
-
“Kyungsoo!” Kyungsoo turns his head, and although he’s in the library and everyone’s supposed to be quiet and all, Chanyeol is… expectedly loud.
“I haven’t seen you around, Kyungsoo, what happened to you? Were you sick? I was so worried,” Chanyeol whispers, suddenly aware of all the pair of eyes on him for disrupting the silence.
“Um.” Kyungsoo fidgets. “I was recuperating in my room-”
“But I went to your room too! No one replied me.”
“You’re not supposed to disturb me! I even told Jongin not to talk to me,” Kyungsoo lies, because Jongin talks to him every five minutes and makes him instant ramen and coffee. “I just needed a rest.”
“Oh,” Chanyeol says, cheeks red. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Kyungsoo exhales, turning back to his book. Shakespeare is a wonder.
“Don’t be mad at me?” Chanyeol says, the tip of his ears still red, “I shouldn’t have went to disturb you and stuff, but I was so worried and Sehun wouldn’t tell me what’s up with you! He said he didn’t know, so I went over. I… I don’t like seeing you angry.”
Kyungsoo’s heart is beating and he blames it entirely on Desdemona’s death. “I’m not angry,” he mumbles, flipping a page and realizing that he can’t take in another word because he’s so drawn away and towards Chanyeol. This is so pathetic. “I’m just… reading.”
“Is it okay if I go over to your room once in a while, I mean,” Chanyeol stumbles over his words, “not like I’m creepy or I want to steal your things or draw on your walls and stuff. I just feel like… we’re not as close anymore, Kyungsoo, so I’m just going to be a permanent guest of your room, okay?”
“If Jongin doesn’t mind,” Kyungsoo replies, and slaps himself internally because, well, Jongin definitely wouldn’t mind. Jongin doesn’t mind anything, unless you mess with his Bleach collection, then he’d probably slaughter you with all the scalpels he can get his hands on. It’s Kyungsoo who’d mind. His heart would.
“That’s a promise, then,” Chanyeol says, and reaches over to ruffle Kyungsoo’s hair before dashing out of the library (quietly).
Some bloody passion shakes your very frame:
These are portents; but yet I hope, I hope,
They do not point on me.
Kyungsoo scratches his head when he turns back to the book. He’s lost the mood to analyze Othello’s speech ever since Chanyeol’d strode in like a whirlwind and strode out with Kyungsoo’s heart behind. He chucks the book into his bag and leaves the library.
-
Chanyeol does as he promised, often whisking himself into Kyungsoo and Jongin’s room without prior notice, and sometimes they stay in there, Chanyeol watching as Kyungsoo draws out complex cell structures with Jongin pointing mistakes out from his side, and other times they run out to Hongdae again. There are no shows the other times they visit, so Chanyeol takes Kyungsoo to the (much feared) club upstairs. Kyungsoo finds out that it’s not as scary as he’d imagined (not that he imagined about being here with Chanyeol much -) and people there are relaxed and composed and extremely adept with what they do.
“I love this place,” Chanyeol had said once, when they were on the train back to school, with a wide grin across his face, “it takes me away from everything.”
“I like it too,” Kyungsoo had replied, staring at the floor. Because it brings me to you.
-
During Valentines’ eve, Kyungsoo pretends he’s not making chocolates at eleven at night. He can feel Jongin’s eyes on his, but Jongin pretends to be nonchalant about the whole process anyway. “For Chanyeol?” Jongin asks when Kyungsoo’s done.
Kyungsoo’s marker is held tight in his grip and he sighs resignedly. “I’m just trying my luck,” he replies, the tip of his marker shaky as he scribbles To: Chanyeol on the fancy wrapping paper. When he’s done cleaning up, Jongin’s asleep on his desk, drool already drying on his textbook and Kyungsoo drapes his blanket over Jongin’s body.
-
“Kyungsoo,” Chanyeol whispers into his ear and Kyungsoo growls as he turns to look at the clock in the room.
“You’re inhumane, Park Chanyeol, it’s six. It’s a Saturday. I refuse.”
Chanyeol lets out a little whine as he glances at Kyungsoo’s snoring roommate carefully. “Help me pick something out for someone.”
Kyungsoo doesn’t know how, but five minutes later, they’re standing outside the nearest florist from their school, and Kyungsoo groggily pulls the hood of his jacket over his head. “You’re a fucking magician, Park Chanyeol, and you need help getting flowers?”
Chanyeol frowns and clutches his shirt in faked agony. “I needed help picking out the flowers, Kyungsoo. I don’t know what I should get.”
“Girlfriend?” Kyungsoo asks, and regrets immediately when Chanyeol grins.
“Sort of.”
They’re not even halfway through the long corridor of flower displays before Kyungsoo gives up trying to be okay. He points at a random flower and stops walking. “Take the tulips. The yellow ones.”
Kyungsoo doesn’t talk to Chanyeol the entire time the florist prepares the flowers, even though Chanyeol keeps trying to strike a conversation with him, and he sighs when Chanyeol asks him which color of wrapping paper he should get. Kyungsoo’s so mad because Chanyeol never told him about the girl he likes. In a fit, he picks green, because green is not a girly color and he’s pretty sure the girl won’t like it because his mother doesn’t. When Chanyeol pays for the flower, Kyungsoo strides out of the florist and tries hard to look okay all the way back to their dorm.
It’s quite a pity that Chanyeol already has someone he likes, although Kyungsoo isn’t sure if he’d even care if he doesn’t like Chanyeol. Too bad. Kyungsoo frowns at the box of chocolates he’d made last night and frowns at Chanyeol’s name on the box and frowns at all the courage he’d mustered up in his guts to even make chocolates for Chanyeol. “Why am I so stupid,” Kyungsoo moans, throwing an arm over his eyes, “of course he has someone he likes.”
When he walks out to dump his chocolate into the trash (Jongin says chocolate and all other sweet stuff should never be disposed of in the room - they had a bad experience with a colony of ants that one time Kyungsoo left a mug of hot chocolate on the desk), he grimaces at everything and everyone and all the couples along the corridor and sighs. He also walks head-first into the door to the locker room and he curses out loud, rubbing the sore spot on his forehead.
When the box of chocolates is finally down in the trash bin, he hopes to never see it again.
-
Summer comes and goes even before Kyungsoo has had a chance to stop striving and put his legs down to breathe. The final year, they said, would be extremely tough. Kyungsoo concedes. This autumn is a strange mix of the smell of pine and scented candles and when their Biology teacher gives her last lecture to the class, she has to breathe deeply to stop the oncoming tears. “You’ve been a great class, I’m thankful I got assigned to you all.” Autumn tastes like the bitter dregs of leftover coffee and rain falls on Kyungsoo but the coolness of the water doesn’t unwind him at all.
It’s all going to end here, the cusp of autumn and winter, where leaves are impeccably red and orange and flowers sway along to the low breeze. The students are beginning to hold parties; for clubs and classes and for everyone else. The last time Kyungsoo had been to one was when he was a freshman, and he stares out of the window sullenly. The oak tree doesn’t look like it’d changed, but Kyungsoo knows the extra marks Chanyeol’d left on the tree that weren’t there before because his failed fire experiments left some burnt marks and soot on the bark.
-
In the midst of feeling extremely sentimental, all Kyungsoo has to dread now, is the graduation night, because he’s sure he won’t be attending any other parties (he’s turned down two already). He doesn’t think he deals with farewells well.
-
Kyungsoo’s hands are shaking with nerves and he exhales shakily when he puts on the black blazer ironed by his proud mom and tries to calm himself down as he smoothes the crease on his long pants out while wiping his clammy hands on them.
Three years of friendship still doesn’t do his nerves any justice at all. He still gets butterflies in his stomach when Chanyeol grins at him and he still finds himself reeling in nerves (and a little anticipation) when Chanyeol leans in a little too close sometimes. As the year comes to a close, Kyungsoo stands at the full-length mirror, staring at his reflection but thinking about all the things he could’ve done but had no guts to this year. The many times he could’ve easily said ‘I like you’ to Chanyeol but decided against it because he thinks it’ll ruin everything there is between them.
He sighs again, just out of frustration, and the frantic knocks on his room door tells him that Chanyeol is all ready and here to go to the graduation ceremony together. Jongin, from his bed, sits up and throws on his blazer wordlessly. Chanyeol bursts through the door in the next second, and the familiarity of it all has Kyungsoo on the edge of tears. It’s nothing new, nothing special, but this might be the very last time he has the chance to see Jongin lounging on the bed opposite his, the last time he will ever get to see Chanyeol barging into his room without an invitation, and probably the last day he will ever see Chanyeol again.
Chanyeol looks at him with questions in his eyes, and turns to Jongin for help but Jongin shrugs (although Kyungsoo knows he knows everything) and leaves the room after slipping his shoes on.
“Hey, are you okay? You look so pale today. Do you wanna stay in? Or-”
“No,” Kyungsoo manages. “I’m fine. It’s just… just a little sad that we’re finally leaving the school and all, you know? I’d miss everyone so much. I’d miss this room, and the noisy neighbors upstairs, the pipe under our toilet sink which perpetually leaks, the big oak tree in the courtyard, everything. I’d miss this,” Kyungsoo says. I’d miss you, too. Kyungsoo has to tear his eyes away from Chanyeol’s face to keep the last part in.
“Me too,” Chanyeol says, and he looks around the room like Kyungsoo did, as though it’s his. Kyungsoo keeps his eyes downcast at the memories streaming into his head. “Shall we go?” Chanyeol says, with one hand already on the door handle and the other extended in Kyungsoo’s direction. Kyungsoo takes it with a small smile, and is tugged into a headlock by Chanyeol’s long arm as they walk through the corridor and into the main hall.
“My blazer,” Kyungsoo hisses, but Chanyeol doesn’t seem to hear it, and if he did, he wasn’t minding it at all.
They enter the hall and in the next five seconds, Kyungsoo’s buried with farewell cards, gift boxes and large bouquets of flowers from his juniors in choir and from his literature workshop and he has to bend his knees to keep all the presents in his arms. Chanyeol laughs, his arms also piling up with gifts and a very eye-catching pink toy guitar, but he looks like he has no problem carrying all those.
“Let me help you,” Chanyeol says, and he takes half of Kyungsoo’s gift load in his hands easily before walking to the chairs and setting them down. Most of the chairs are labeled with names of the students, but Chanyeol just leaves the gifts on the chairs meant for the guests. When Kyungsoo asks if they should move the piles to their own seats, Chanyeol only chuckles. “My parents will be coming,” he explains. “They better take that home for me. And I can keep your stuff for you first.”
“Okay,” Kyungsoo replies, although he’s still uneasy. Chanyeol sees the apprehension in Kyungsoo’s eyes and he grabs Kyungsoo’s hands without thinking, before yanking him along as he runs towards their other friends. It’s hard to disagree that his heart doesn’t leap every time he has Kyungsoo’s hands in his, but he’d rather not confirm his doubts.
Behind him, Kyungsoo is flushed a deep red, wondering if Chanyeol minds his palms clammy with nervous sweat.
But Chanyeol doesn’t see that.
Sehun and Jongin, with another friend from their biology class, Zitao, are over at the drinks table and Chanyeol stops by them to say hi. Jongin looks extremely distracted and Sehun manages a weak smile but Zitao throws himself on Kyungsoo first, patting his cheeks before winding his (muscular, may Kyungsoo add) arms around Chanyeol, patting the back of Chanyeol’s head although it’s an awkward position because Chanyeol’s taller than Zitao. Nevertheless, Chanyeol grins and ruffles Zitao’s hair and Kyungsoo smiles gratefully and the pair flits around the hall, saying hi to everyone they know and everyone they don’t.
When they finally are requested to be seated, Chanyeol tears off the sticker of the seat beside Kyungsoo’s and replaces it with his own. He sits down before grinning at Kyungsoo and Kyungsoo is trying to calm his racing heartbeat but fails to do so.
Luckily, the ceremony starts. Sehun gets the top score in biology and Kyungsoo for literature; Kyungsoo cheers as their choir president, Jongdae, receive an award for winning the regional sing-offs and Chanyeol doesn’t get anything at all, but he’s the one who’s sobbing when the whole formal ceremony ends.
“I can’t - I can’t believe I made such great friends,” Chanyeol half-sobs, half-sniffs, “and I’m so proud of all of you, oh my god,” he says, blinking his tears back as he clutches the award that Kyungsoo got to his chest.
Sehun chuckles, a soft, pleasant sound, and he then hugs both Chanyeol and Kyungsoo goodbye before walking off with Jongin trailing quietly behind. Jongin turns back to wave with a sad smile clinging to the side of his lips, and Kyungsoo is hit with realization. The way Jongin seems to revolve around Sehun, how Jongin has basically turned into a muted vegetable after Sehun had announced that he would be going to California to further his studies in biology during lunch that day. Jongin isn’t going there - heck, he doesn’t even like biology, and Kyungsoo remembers that he’s going to take history in Yonsei.
“What’s wrong?” Chanyeol asks again, a hand waving in front of Kyungsoo’s face, and Kyungsoo blinks.
“Ah, nothing,” he murmurs. “Just thinking about stupid things, again, you know.”
“I wish you’d stop thinking,” Chanyeol says, handing the award back to Kyungsoo and carding his fingers through Kyungsoo’s hair. The gesture is oddly intimate, in a hall full of people, and Kyungsoo feels his cheeks burn.
“I’m just… overwhelmed by feelings, that’s all,” Kyungsoo smiles. “I’m sorry.”
“Nothing to apologize about,” Chanyeol replies smoothly, and they go around the hall again, talking to everyone and before Kyungsoo knows it, time’s up.
“Where will you be going?” Kyungsoo asks, but he already knows the answer. Chanyeol tells him every time, and he expects the answer to be the same but he needs a confirmation, anyway.
“To America,” Chanyeol’s voice drops to a whisper. “You know I’ve always wanted to be a famous magician, you know that.”
Kyungsoo knows, but it doesn’t help to reduce the pain in his heart that’s slowly turning into a dull ache as they go through this process again and again. It’s just that today might be the last time he’s ever hearing this, so he concedes.
When Chanyeol’s parents’ car pulls up at the porch, Kyungsoo thinks everything’s too late. Chanyeol still looks somewhat expectant, as if he’s waiting for Kyungsoo to say something, and Kyungsoo does want to say something, but he doesn’t dare to.
“I guess this is it?” Chanyeol says.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t think I’ll ever forget you,” Chanyeol quips, like they’re talking about the weather tonight instead of their permanent farewell and the imminent breaking of Kyungsoo’s heart. “You’ve been a really great friend, Do Kyungsoo.”
“I-” like you. “Could say the same for you,” Kyungsoo replies.
“If fate allows it, we’ll definitely meet again, okay? Keep in touch,” Chanyeol says, and that’s all he says before climbing into the car, long limbs and all, and he waves at Kyungsoo for the last time before slamming the door shut.
Kyungsoo watches as the car steers out of the campus gates, and the ‘I like you’ is still etched on the tip of his tongue. He picks up his gifts from the bench and pretends he didn’t just send the love of his life away in a red Honda.
-
When he opens the room door with weary feet, he’s taken aback by Sehun and Jongin curled up together on Jongin’s bed (although Kyungsoo had predicted that), but Sehun’s eyes are red and puffy and Jongin looks like he’d been crying, too. Sehun makes no move to detach himself from Jongin when he sees Kyungsoo but he just bawls even louder, and Jongin gives Kyungsoo a sad glance.
Kyungsoo shrugs, lifts his bags and closes the door behind him as he leaves.
The bus ride home is oddly silent, the bus relatively empty, and it’s a perfect representation of his heart. Sehun and Jongin just now had made him even lonelier inside, and when he checks his phone he sees that Chanyeol had sent him a text twenty minutes ago.
America, here I come!
Kyungsoo deletes the text with shaky hands, and dismisses all thoughts of wanting to send Chanyeol off at the airport. He grits his teeth and really decides against it. One time was enough; he didn’t need a second round of separation.
-
Before Kyungsoo sleeps, he checks his phone again and there’s a text from Jongin but nothing from Chanyeol.
Thank you for everything, the text from Jongin says.
It’s fine, he types back. That’s what friends are for.
When he falls asleep, he dreams of airplanes taking off in clear skies and waking up in a bed that’s not his. He dreams of high top hats on chestnut hair and rabbits in magic boxes, glitter on skin and gel on hair as the spotlight shines from above.
-
When he wakes up, his heart is thumping fast.
Chanyeol doesn’t send him anything else, and Kyungsoo doesn’t know if he should feel happy or sad at this fact. He should be happy that Chanyeol isn’t going to extend his misery by making Kyungsoo miss him, but he’s also partially sad that Chanyeol doesn’t miss him as much as he thinks he does, today being his departure day and all.
The first half of the day passes without much excitement, without Chanyeol spamming Kyungsoo with pictures of cute puppies on every social networking site they both visit, and there are no annoying messages left by Chanyeol on their KakaoTalk chat. Kyungsoo, for once, thinks this is quite depressing, seeing how he usually passes his day like that, and his phone suddenly feels very heavy in his hands.
The university application forms are also sitting on his desk as he mulls over the loss of a close friend, and Kyungsoo groans loudly. He’s at such a dilemma - he knows Chanyeol is probably about to take off, and Kyungsoo must be this big of an asshat to not send his best friend off with his best regards; but Kyungsoo knows he can’t do that coolly like he wants. He’d probably break down and cry in front of Chanyeol, and (this has happened many times, in Kyungsoo’s imagination) if Chanyeol decides to stay because of Kyungsoo, Kyungsoo would feel so guilty for ruining Chanyeol’s dreams. Kyungsoo rolls on his bed, lets out a frustrated whine and then his phone rings.
Kyungsoo’s a little shaken as he answers the call, because he’d been waiting for a call for so long (an entire night and a morning, okay), and when he’d given up, the call finally comes. “Hello?”
“Kyungsoo!” Chanyeol laughs, bright and free from across the line. “I’m at the airport! Can you smell the fresh air from here?”
“How is the air at the airport fresh,” Kyungsoo mutters bitterly.
“Well, sure feels like it! You sure you don’t want to come and take a photo with me or something? Come on, I’d even buy you coffee.”
“I - I gotta help my mom marinate some kimchi,” Kyungsoo says lamely, although his mom is actually already done with all the marinating. “Sorry. I do this every year, you know that, right? Can’t ditch this. You go out there and…” Kyungsoo exhales. “Do me proud. Okay?”
“Okay,” Chanyeol says, and if he sounded sad, Kyungsoo wouldn’t be able to hear it, over the buzz of trolley wheels and planes taking off. “I’ll email you or something. I have to go board the plane now. Bye, Kyungsoo.”
The call ends and Kyungsoo holds his phone to his ear, listening to the beep tone. It’s fifteen seconds until he finally opens his mouth. “Bye.”
Kyungsoo spends the night drowning himself in stacks of old calculus worksheets, but he finds solace in lines after lines of derivation and integration, and the frustrated scribbles of wrong workings and wrong answers against fresh paper is oddly relieving. When he’s done redoing a month’s worth of exercises, he stares at the ceiling quietly. Day one without Park Chanyeol. If he’d survived today, the days to come wouldn’t be so bad, would it?
-
It would.
The next week, Kyungsoo finds himself pulling his hair out over which university he should go to, which course he should take (since he’s okay with all his subjects and he has no particular interest), and if he should contact Chanyeol. He looks at the photo framed up on his desk - it’s him and Chanyeol, laughing as Kyungsoo smeared whipped cream all over Chanyeol’s face under the oak tree because it was Jongin’s birthday and he had refused to take part in the cake-smashing because of his acne outbreak. Jongin had taken the photo back then, printed it out and gave Kyungsoo a copy with a coy grin. That brat.
His heart clenches a little when he sees the smile on Chanyeol’s face in the photo, and he turns the photo frame face-down on the tabletop with a growl. Maybe not today.
In his mind a crazy idea stirs: what if he went to America too? To look for Chanyeol? Maybe they could make it big together? Kyungsoo realizes, albeit a little too late, that he’s grinning into the air. He slaps himself lightly and reminds himself that dreams should remain just dreams. He looks down, and it’s the application form from Yonsei. Well, Yonsei it is. He writes course names onto little strips of paper and crushes them all and picks one - social sciences. Well, then. He fills in the form quickly and slips it in a huge manila envelope, tossing all the other forms into the bin.
-
The rest of the chilly winter is spent with Kyungsoo working part-time at a clothing store in a shopping mall near his house with Sehun, and for Christmas Kyungsoo gets a snapback for Sehun because they’d put them on sometimes, for fun, when there are no customers, and Kyungsoo had thought that Sehun looked good with them on. And Sehun seemed to really like them, anyway. Sehun blushes prettily and accepts the gift, giving Kyungsoo a hug later.
“I didn’t plan anything, I’m sorry,” Sehun says, but he’s leading them to a nearby eatery and Sehun places his wallet on the table. “But you can order anything you want. I’ll pay.”
After three huge bowls of ddeokbokki and two plates of kimchi fried rice, Kyungsoo surrenders and calls for a glass of iced tea. Sehun laughs around his mouthful of fried squid, but says nothing otherwise.
Sehun pays, as he promised, and when they walk home later in the dark (it really is pretty late, Kyungsoo realizes), Kyungsoo feels empty all of a sudden.
“You’re really a good friend, do you know that?” Sehun says, kicking a stray empty plastic bottle to one side of the road. Before Kyungsoo can ask why, Sehun hisses and glares at Kyungsoo. “Because you tried to make friends with me when I offered,” he says. “People think I’m a rebel and all that just because I dye my hair in many colors, like what,” Sehun drawls and rolls his eyes, and Kyungsoo notices that his hair is lilac today.
“Hey, you dyed your hair again,” Kyungsoo breathes, holding up strands of Sehun’s hair in the warm orange light under the lamp post.
“Last week,” Sehun mutters. “Well, but the point is, thank you for being my friend. I don’t think I’ve ever told you this, but well, yeah. Chanyeol could never be half as considerate as you are.” Chanyeol. Kyungsoo’s biting his bottom lip by now. “Chanyeol… he misses you. He sends me emails sometimes, asking me why you don’t contact him after he left. I don’t know, Kyungsoo, do you?”
“I…” Kyungsoo hadn’t planned on sharing his feelings with other people, but it’s Sehun, it’s his friend and Kyungsoo’s on the verge of breaking. “I like him so much, Sehun, I can’t bear to think about him being somewhere else other than by my side. I’ve thought about - about going to America, but I couldn’t find my courage to do that like he did.”
“I know it’s kind of silly to want him to stick with me since his dreams were there even before we met, but it’s natural to be selfish, right?”
“Love is selfish,” Sehun mumbles. “Jongin didn’t want me to go to California, that’s why you saw us crying in your room that time. I knew how he felt, I guess, since Chanyeol was bent on leaving and he’s like a brother to me… So I decided to stay in Korea, although we’ll be in different schools. He didn’t mind.”
Kyungsoo smiles. “I knew he liked you… from the start, actually. It’s really different when you live with someone for a while.”
“I knew, too,” Sehun sighs. “But let’s not talk about me. What about you? Chanyeol’s practically turning my world over to find the reason why you won’t talk to him anymore. I need to give him a reply. Do I just tell him that you like him or-”
Kyungsoo stumbles over a step on the floor. “Don’t you dare, Oh Sehun,” he says. “I’ll tell Jongin that you like to scrape the old bubblegum under the desk with your nails.”
“Okay,” Sehun gives in hurriedly, hands raised in the air. “I won’t. Just tell me what to tell him. I promise not to say anything I shouldn’t.”
“Just say… that I wish him all the best in America? And he better not forget me, like what he promised,” Kyungsoo says, and his voice shakes at the end. Sehun puts an arm around Kyungsoo, but the outer comfort is doing nothing to Kyungsoo’s hollowness inside. “If we meet in the future, and he doesn’t know who I am, I’m going to smash his nose,” Kyungsoo laughs.
“You’d have to grow taller first,” Sehun says with a soft chuckle, and Kyungsoo growls but they continue walking in comfortable silence after.
Then Sehun stops walking, and Kyungsoo looks up and realizes that this it’s already the juncture where they say goodbyes and ‘see you tomorrow’s. Goodbye is too bitter tonight. Sehun pats Kyungsoo’s head, turns around and waves before walking off. The orange light from above is making the snow on the floor look like it’s orange, and Kyungsoo’s strangely reminded of those days in autumn where the patch of grass under the oak tree would be perpetually covered in orange leaves. Chanyeol would sweep them away with Kyungsoo so that they could sit under the tree without leaves poking and tickling their legs.
Kyungsoo lets out a shaky breath and heads home.
-
The years and months spent in university feels longer without Chanyeol there, but Kyungsoo thinks it’s still manageable. He’s met many new friends: Hyunsik, especially, who rooms with him, and he made friends with the rowdy senior back in school; Lu Han, who turned out to be a really nice guy, and Jinho, who he met in the literature prep talk (Kyungsoo didn’t take literature, but it feels nice to be reminded of Chanyeol again and again) and eventually became friends, even if they took different courses and ended up in different parts of the school and things like that. Jongin is also there, and they’re still good friends, with Kyungsoo making food for Jongin too often and Jongin, who knew how to avoid the Chanyeol topic well because he knows. Kyungsoo appreciates that.
By the time he graduates, he sees school as a good riddance except for the friends he’s made, but still, none comes close to being as impactful as Chanyeol was. Oh, Chanyeol. You’d think years of life without Chanyeol would have him erased in Kyungsoo’s mind, but it’s quite the reverse. Kyungsoo can’t fall asleep without thinking about Chanyeol and when winter rolls by he wonders how winter in America is like, if Chanyeol’s wearing the scarf that Kyungsoo knitted for him some years back.
It’s a little silly, but by the end of university, too, he’s gotten used to the dull ache in his heart whenever he thinks about Chanyeol or whenever someone mentions Chanyeol during their high school reunion dinners. Kyungsoo’s also determined about what to do in the future.
-
part three