A Pen Needs a Page [2/2]
Two
Instead of trying to capture Baekhyun’s personality and putting it down on paper, Kyungsoo copies all the things he likes about Baekhyun.
Baekhyun’s personality is ever changing, but he still sneaks in his a thousand watt grin no matter the occasion. One strand of hair always seems to go rogue no matter what hairstyle he tries out, causing Baekhyun to frown as he wets it down, disgruntled when it still sticks up. He has never mentioned it before, but Kyungsoo noticed that he carries around a small notepad with him, recording down whatever comes to him at the moment.
He envisions a smiling Baekhyun. One where his eyes crinkles when he laughs too hard or when his nose scrunches up when holding back a sneeze. The image of Baekhyun that Kyungsoo familiarizes himself with the most.
Kyungsoo stares at the half of page that isn’t nearly as full. On the top he wrote ‘negative points about Byun Baekhyun’, yet he only has a few. How he calls him Soo without permission, or how he decides what they are doing and when, not bothering to ask about Kyungsoo’s schedule whatsoever. Honestly, as Kyungsoo looks at the small list, these offenses are relatively minor compared to the positives flooding on the other side.
It’s when he receives a call from a bar that Kyungsoo sees to Baekhyun.
The clock reads 2:12 a.m. when he hears the phone ringing, shaking Kyungsoo out from the beginning of his sleep. He was restless anyway, finally climbing into bed around one, staring at the ceiling before he managed to shut his eyes.
But now that’s over.
Aimlessly, he searches for his cell phone, fumbling around on his nightstand. He accidentally grabs his deodorant instead, growling as he chucks it to the floor before getting a hold of the right thing.
It’s the number for some bar that he’s heard of once but never visited; Kyungsoo answers hesitantly, “Hello?”
“Hello, is this Soo?” The person on the other end questions the name, and Kyungsoo would too if he was in his position.
The only person who calls him that is Baekhyun. “I guess.”
“I’m sorry for disturbing you this early in the morning, but we happen to have Byun Baekhyun down here with us, and it’s safe to say he’s drunk. Your number happened to be first in his priority contacts, so we figured we’d give you call and see if you can come pick him up.”
He calls a cab as soon as he hangs up the phone, shrugging on his winter jacket and slipping into some decent looking pajama bottoms. The pants are light blue with clouds on them, and he probably looks very disheveled with his messy hair, but he can’t bring himself to care and heads out the door in them anyway.
When he gets outside, it’s raining. Just his luck he thinks as he opens the door, stepping inside quickly. The cab driver gives him a strange look at his appearance but doesn’t make a comment, which he’s grateful for.
The bar feels stuffy, packed with people. Many of them reek of alcohol but have someone draped across their shoulder, dragging them out or monitoring them. Kyungsoo dislikes getting drunk, and he doesn’t understand the feeling of letting loose, as people have told him in the past. Sure, he can drink a beer when he’s with a group of friends, but nothing like this.
It’s actually easy to spot Baekhyun, his face lying down on top of the bar counter, completely alone besides the bartender cleaning off glasses from behind.
Kyungsoo approaches, noticing that drool has dribbled down Baekhyun’s chin, while his hand still clutches a half-filled glass of vodka. His breath smells like alcohol, and his white shirt has a stain on it now.
The guy behind the bar looks over at him. “Are you the Soo guy?” Once he nods, the other pulls a phone out of his pocket, handing it over to him. “Here’s his phone. He tried to throw it across the room a couple of times, so I took it before it could, you know, break.”
“Thanks,” Kyungsoo says. The guy waves him off, as he walks to the other side of the room, helping out someone else.
With Baekhyun passed out, Kyungsoo takes the chance to look at his phone and see if he can find his address somewhere. Accidentally, he clicks on the contacts button and sees his name saved as ‘Soo~ ♡.’ Blushing, Kyungsoo exits the contacts and hunts for his address, gurgling incoherently every couple of seconds.
At his side, Baekhyun slowly rouses out of his sleep, yawning loudly. His eyes flutter open, blinking a few times before he grins up at Kyungsoo. “Soo yah!” Baekhyun squeals, throwing his arms out and hugging Kyungsoo to him, the contents of his glass spilling out onto his jeans. “I missed you so much!”
Kyungsoo lightly pushes him away. “Let’s get you out of here.”
Baekhyun starts giggling, “Soo, you’re so cute when you’re trying to be authoritative.” The end of his sentence slurs, as he pokes Kyungsoo in the chest twice. “Why don’t you stay a while? Drink with me!”
Baekhyun waggles his finger, trying to summon the bartender over to him, but Kyungsoo captures his hand, bringing it back down. “Baekhyun, hyung, you’re drunk. Let’s just go.”
“I’m not-“ Baekhyun nearly topples out of his chair, and Kyungsoo scrambles to catch him before he hits the ground. He regains his posture, remarking, “I am not drunk. Byun Baekhyun gets nothing more than tipsy! If that! Ha!” He’s basically shouting now, earning looks from other people in the bar, and the last he wants is to draw unwanted attention.
Kyungsoo winces, giving a sharp tug once more to Baekhyun’s arm. “You’re ruining all the fun, Soo! Sit down, have a drink! It’s on me, I swear.” He pats the stool next to him for good measure, pulling at Kyungsoo’s jacket.
With a sigh, Kyungsoo sits down, watching as Baekhyun giggles childishly at him. Kyungsoo coughs, “You can’t stay here. You have a draft to be working on right now. Come on.”
Something in Baekhyun’s eyes changes, leading him to glare at Kyungsoo as he scoffs. “Writing? I’m not a writer.”
Confused, Kyungsoo says, “Of course you are.”
Rolling his eyes, Baekhyun counters, “Of course I’m a writer. Or more like I want to be, but I’m a failure. A failure.”
“Baekhyun, what are y-“
“I haven’t been able to write in months okay? Months.” Now that stuns Kyungsoo, giving Baekhyun the chance to continue on. “Yes, I’ve been writing, but I just can’t come up with anything that is new, creative. The publishing company called my ideas ‘child’s play’ and that I should come back when I have a fucking good storyline.”
“But you’re a good writer. No, a brilliant writer.” Kyungsoo offers, “I’ve read your works. You are good, really good.”
Baekhyun smiles, “If only that were it.” He looks at him, letting Kyungsoo see how drunk he looks, but his words are genuine. “Look, the publishing company doesn’t want to talk to me for two reasons. One, because I can’t come up with shit for the life of me, and two, because I was caught sucking off a random guy.”
Kyungsoo tries to interject, but Baekhyun beats him to it. “I was desperate for money at the time. And he was just there, so I just did it. Sucked him off just like that. He paid me a good amount, but some asshole on the street recognized my face, and I can’t write freely right now, not with this scandal hanging above my head. No one wants to read the work of a failure.”
He turns his head away, fixated on his twiddling thumbs, words beginning to slur again. “Writers, we’re meant to be free you know? But in reality, we’re just like everyone else. Stuck.”
His eyes are distant now, staring at the wooden floors that run along the bar’s ground. The silence is deafening, but Kyungsoo lets it slide as a tear runs down Baekhyun’s face. Suddenly, tears are falling much more quickly, streaking the tops of his cheeks and dribbling onto his jutted lips. Kyungsoo leans in, quietly wiping away his tears with his sleeve of his jacket, as Baekhyun continues to cry silently. And Kyungsoo lets him, lets him cry to his heart’s content.
It’s a half an hour later when Kyungsoo coaxes Baekhyun out of the bar, the alcohol starting to take effect in a different manner and make him sleepy. The taxi he called for earlier waits for them, as Kyungsoo carefully slides him into the seat, buckling him in safely.
Baekhyun falls asleep in the car ride to his apartment, which is a nice twenty-minute drive from the bar. He holds onto Kyungsoo’s hand the entire drive back, and Kyungsoo allows it, stroking the back of Baekhyun’s hand with his thumb.
The rain patters against the window, streaming down almost like Baekhyun’s tear had: suddenly and quickly.
It’s the first time Kyungsoo has ever been to Baekhyun’s apartment, he realizes as soon as they arrive, the building just a few stories high and looks sad in the rain. He shakes Baekhyun’s arm, struggling to get the drowsy Baekhyun out of the cab’s seats. Regaining his energy, Kyungsoo heaves his body once, and Baekhyun slides out easier than expected.
The elevator ride is quick and leads him straight to Baekhyun’s apartment. He rummages through Baekhyun’s pockets to see if he has the door’s password written down anywhere. It’s hard ignoring the feeling bubbling up in his stomach, but it’s three a.m., and Baekhyun is nearly passed out in his arms, in a total drunk way.
With no such luck, Kyungsoo gently nudges Baekhyun. It takes a few moments before Baekhyun begins to stir, digging his nose into the crook of Kyungsoo’s neck. The noise he makes is close to a puppy whining, and Kyungsoo thinks it’s unbearably cute, but now is definitely not the time.
“Hyung, I need your passcode.” His eyes are open, but Baekhyun doesn’t respond, instead snuggling into his shoulder some more. “Can you tell me it?”
Into his neck, Baekhyun mumbles, “I don’t want to tell you.”
Kyungsoo sighs. “But then we’re stuck out here.”
Baekhyun crinkles his nose, pouting and leaning away from Kyungsoo, his hand reaching out towards the keypad on his door. He skillfully punches in the code despite the awkward position he’s in before curling back up into Kyungsoo’s shoulder.
Kyungsoo figures it’s best if they go in, so he heaves Baekhyun inside, pulling off his and the other’s shoes at the entrance. Baekhyun wears striped toe socks, ones he shown Kyungsoo before; it was just the two of them, sitting alone in Baekhyun’s inspiration space. Baekhyun displayed them to Kyungsoo by wiggling toes right in his face. Apparently they were the comfiest socks on the entire world and Baekhyun demanded that Kyungsoo buy a pair of his own.
He actually did buy them. Of course, without Baekhyun knowing he did. The elder male would never him live it down.
Kyungsoo cracks a smile when he sees them, lifting Baekhyun up and trying to find his bedroom. Getting Baekhyun onto his large bed proves to be a feat, but once he positions Baekhyun’s torso on the mattress, he manages to lift his lower half as well.
He props Baekhyun against the pillows, studying his face. Kyungsoo sits down on the bed, unbuttoning Baekhyun’s jacket to give him some air. In a quiet voice, he says, “I’d read anything you’d write any day. Because it’s yours.”
For just a moment, he closes his eyes, breathing in and out slowly while listening to Baekhyun’s steady breaths. The rain still falls in the background, just lightly enough to hit the window every few seconds. And for the first time, Kyungsoo actually doesn’t mind hearing the rain. Just the little dripping sounds calms him, accompanying his and Baekhyun’s breathing.
Carefully, he peals himself away, adjusting his pajama bottoms that had ridden up his ankles. He pushes aside the one curling strand of hair Baekhyun always has, but it just flops back to place.
One last time, Kyungsoo looks at Baekhyun. This time though, Baekhyun’s eyes meet his, looking fully awake with his hands tucked underneath his head. “Soo,” Baekhyun calls up at him, a closed smile formed on his lips. “Stay with me, just for tonight, okay?”
When Kyungsoo doesn’t respond, Baekhyun uses his index finger to beckon him down to his height level. Kyungsoo sits back down, getting closer to the other who frowns at the distance. He motions Kyungsoo to come even closer, so he does, and then Baekhyun leans up, pressing their lips together. It’s brief, their lips brushing on top of one another’s, but it feels good.
Before Kyungsoo even realizes what’s happened, Baekhyun has pulled away, smiling with his crescent eyes. Then, Baekhyun shuts his eyes, sliding his hands beneath the pillows.
Baekhyun spreads himself out across the entire bed, falling asleep as soon as his eyes are closed. Kyungsoo covers Baekhyun with the thin blanket hanging off the end of the bed, pausing to watch him, matching the smile set on Baekhyun’s face. Sighing, Kyungsoo shuffles out of the room, closing the bedroom door behind him.
He leans against the doorframe, thinking about what just happened and how it happened so quickly, not even giving Kyungsoo time to react to the kiss. He settles on the couch, throwing his feet on the armrest, letting his eyes fall shut.
The kiss is the last thing that lingers on his mind when he finally falls asleep.
÷
It’s early in the morning when Kyungsoo wakes up, the stream of light glaring down into his eyes. Groaning, he sits up from the couch where he parked himself last night. His head is throbbing in pain, and all he can think about is how he could really use a cup of coffee right now.
When he finally takes a moment to scan the apartment, he sees Baekhyun watching him from the kitchen counter. His eyes droop down like he has barely gotten any sleep, and it’s probably true. Based on how bright the sun is, Kyungsoo figures it’s around nine or ten in the morning.
Gulping and gathering his courage, Kyungsoo saunters over to the counter across from Baekhyun, letting his socks drag across the wood floor. Wordlessly, Baekhyun hands him some coffee he had already prepared. He accepts it gratefully, murmuring a thank you under his breath before sipping on it lightly, careful not to burn his tongue.
The overhang of silence sits awkwardly with Kyungsoo, both of them tentatively taking small swigs from the mug, and then setting it down. Then after a few moments, they repeat.
Kyungsoo allows this to happen until he can nearly see the bottom of his mug. He frowns; it was good coffee.
“What…” Kyungsoo starts, trying to figure out how to phrase what he wants to say. He sighs, “What exactly happened last night?”
Baekhyun smirks a little, the corner of his mouth just tilting up. “You tell me. I was the one drunk off my ass.”
He’s teasing. He’s probably trying to avoid it, Kyungsoo deduces. “I’m serious here.”
Baekhyun’s intense gaze meets his, and his face becomes blank. “Do we really have to talk about it? It’s not like you’re my mother, Kyungsoo.”
Baekhyun calling him by his full name makes his stomach churn. On Baekhyun’s lips, it sounds so foreign, and Kyungsoo didn’t even realize he didn’t want to his full name like that until now.
“Are you embarrassed?”
“I don’t think you’re in any position to ask me that.” Baekhyun counters, taking both of their cups and throwing them into his dishwasher.
The answer makes Kyungsoo fume. “So what am I allowed to ask you?”
Baekhyun doesn’t have an answer to that, only looking mindlessly at his dishwasher. Restarting, Kyungsoo questions, “Do you remember anything that happened last night?”
Baekhyun’s hands come up to grip the edge of the countertop, heaving a sigh. He looks back over at Kyungsoo. “Do you really want to know?” Kyungsoo nods, staring at Baekhyun expectantly. “I remember everything. From when I got to the bar; to when that manager tried to pull me out, but couldn’t; to when you showed up and to when you brought me back here. I remember it all.”
“So you remember that you kissed me?” Kyungsoo continues. He thinks he knows the answer, but he just wants to confirm it.
Swallowing thickly, Baekhyun confesses, “I do.”
Kyungsoo notices his hands are dry. “Did it mean anything to you?”
The elder male halts. He breathes in before he focuses his attention back on Kyungsoo. “Can we not talk about it?”
“It’s kind of important hyung.” Kyungsoo eyes narrow unknowingly. When Baekhyun doesn’t even try to defend himself, Kyungsoo continues, “It’s important to me. I don’t know what it meant to you, but it meant a lot to me.”
Baekhyun seems to concentrate on everything that isn’t Kyungsoo, which just irritates the latter more. “I don’t care about your past. It’s not your present right?” He still stands, silent. Kyungsoo sighs, “Since you don’t want to talk, I think it’ll be best if I just leave.”
He gathers his things quickly; the atmosphere is becoming suffocating at a rapid rate, and Kyungsoo can’t handle it. He heads towards the door, almost tripping over his shoes as he tries to slide them on. He can feel Baekhyun’s eyes trained on him, but as soon as he wiggles on his left shoe, he heads towards the front entrance.
Kyungsoo hears Baekhyun call after him, but he pushes forward. He throws over his shoulder, “Come find me when you’re ready,” before closing the door silently behind him.
÷
When Kyungsoo arrives back to his apartment, the first thing he does is makes his way to his bedroom. He instantly ruffles through his drawers, searching for his notebook, the one where he wrote about Baekhyun.
After digging relentlessly through his various things, he finally finds it buried underneath a scarf. He flips through the few pages he had written down information on, staring at them blankly. His fingers hover at the seam, tempted to rip them out and throw them away, but they never tear the pages out no matter how longer they inch along the crease, wanting to shred them to pieces.
He tosses the notebook back onto the table it was in, then lies back on his bed. It’s already close to five a.m., but Kyungsoo doesn’t really care about the time as he shuts his eye, breathing in and out deeply. The rain violently hits his bedroom window as he finally dozes off. It’s almost as if the rain is tapping into his emotions.
And for the first time, Kyungsoo doesn’t dream at all.
÷
The next week passes without a word from Baekhyun.
The first day he decides to filter all thoughts of Baekhyun into the back of his mind. Kyungsoo reckons he needs his time, and he’s willing to provide nothing but time.
He became so accustomed to a bright smile and teasing comments on a regular basis, his life suddenly appears dim. And without Baekhyun, it becomes increasingly more difficult to write freely.
He spends the week working on a draft for a potential novel, but even Kyungsoo knows it’s mediocre at best. He submits the draft nonetheless, figuring it’s worth a shot after producing nothing for over a month.
And it’s no surprise when the company calls him back, instantly shooting down the idea and telling him to think of something new, plausible, and isn’t explicitly mundane. They never outright tell him that having a passion for writing isn’t the same as being a writer, but Kyungsoo knows the statement is implied.
With all the free time Kyungsoo suddenly finds he has, he works on even more outlines that come from an abundant of genres. More than half of them end up making a home in his trashcan and when the can overflows with all of the dull ideas, Kyungsoo simply crosses out anything he rejects. Still, he creates nothing decent enough to be satisfactory.
The publishing company calls a few days later while he’s eating lunch, or at least trying to get something in his stomach. Lately, everything makes him nauseous. Even the sound of something brings certain distaste to his tongue, so he opts to drink water and brew coffee.
“Anything?” The guy on the other end asks, and luckily it’s Junmyeon who doesn’t snap at him when Kyungsoo usually breaks the news that he still has next to nothing. He realizes that the company is probably just as desperate as he is right now, needing Kyungsoo to conjure up something. Although they know he can’t produce something out of thin air, pressure is still pushed on. “Anything at all? At least a plot? Maybe an idea for a character?”
A character pops into his head. Warm smile, eyes that turn into crescents when they are excited, styled hair, pink cotton candy and a pen.
There’s an unspoken ban on that one though.
“Nothing.” He hesitates, frowning when he catches the sigh on the other side of the line. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to have a novel Kyungsoo, just something. Something to let us know you’re ready. We can’t keep having you push this off. Okay?”
Kyungsoo agrees wordlessly, letting the conversation slowly drop off. “I guess,” Junmyeon starts, “I’ll hear from you soon? Hopefully with good news.”
The other male on the line has his finger over the ‘end’ button before Kyungsoo interrupts, “How’s Baekhyun?”
Another sigh. “I don’t quite know actually. He’s stopped by once earlier this week.” Well, that’s news to Kyungsoo. He doesn’t remember the last Baekhyun ever mentioned going to the company willingly.
“Do you know why?” Kyungsoo bites on his lower lip, anxious to know the answer. The promise he made to himself earlier, the one about removing all thoughts of Baekhyun at the moment, is abandoned easily. He needs to know.
“Kyungsoo, he would never tell me. And I think you know that.” Junmyeon chuckles lowly, attempting to get Kyungsoo to smile, but he can’t force it. It’s not possible.
“He’ll come around, Kyungsoo. Whatever it is you’re worried about that is.” Junmyeon is likely to be cracking a smile on the other end, just like he always does. In a teasing tone, the elder male quips, “Get some rest. I have faith in my little writer.”
Kyungsoo snorts in good measure. “You’re not that much older than me, hyung.”
Before he hangs up, he catches the short, “I know,” that Junmyeon throws in.
A minute later, his cell phone vibrates, and Kyungsoo picks it up curiously, having not received a text in over a week. It’s from Junmyeon, the only person from the publishing company who actually has his phone number. It reads Work hard my little writer. I have faith in you! ^^
His first urge is to cringe at the cheesiness, but he can’t fight the smile that etches itself onto his face no matter how hard he tries to get rid of it.
He averts his attention back to the notebook laying spread out on his cushions, and Kyungsoo thinks that maybe, just maybe he can try. For the company. For Junmyeon. For Baekhyun.
And so, he writes.
÷
A month passes by in a flash without any contact from Baekhyun.
It’s disappointing, yes, but doable, Kyungsoo comes to realize; his focus shifts to writing, and writing something worth reading.
Soon enough, Kyungsoo reverts himself back to his favorite coffee shop, making it into his second home. Every day around eleven in the morning, he finds himself tripping out of his apartment doorway and strolling down the street towards the building it resides in. On the rainy days, Kyungsoo searches for a hot pink umbrella, but it never appears.
The more often he visits the coffee shop, the more often he can relax his muscles and his mind, sipping on whatever drink he decides on for the day wordlessly while settled in his special spot.
The young barista named Jongin always whips him up whatever he feels like making, leaving Kyungsoo pleasantly surprised by some of the drinks. Some of them leave a bitter taste on his tongue, and some are far too sweet for his taste buds, but he gives them all a shot. Occasionally, Jongin will hand him a coffee that reminds him of what Baekhyun would drink, and those are the ones Kyungsoo likes the most.
It so happens that he is not only fond of Jongin because of the variety of drinks he serves, but he’s also proving to me a good informant.
Jongin keeps him up to date on Baekhyun’s appearances in the shop as well, since he too has a special preference for this place. The only information Jongin provides though is approximately what time Baekhyun stopped by and what he ordered. All worthless in reality, but it at least lets Kyungsoo know that Baekhyun is well and functional. And Jongin cooperates happily, grinning like the child he is when Kyungsoo slips him a few extra dollars in tip.
It’s a Wednesday, and Kyungsoo arranges himself and his belongings across the span of two chairs and a coffee table. No one bothers him anyway since most people take their coffee to go, save for the three or four other people who have the same train of thought as him. He perches his feet up on the side of one of the armchairs, letting his shoeless feet dangle over it.
He brought his laptop today instead of his notebook; the last time he came, Kyungsoo accidentally spilled more than half of his coffee all over the pages, causing him to lose much of his valued writing. Making out the words he wrote down proves to be a task, but it’s possible with lots of squinting and patience.
He’s laboriously typing away before someone takes a seat directly across from him, moving his possessions aside to make room for their things. Kyungsoo blindly looks up, instantly freezing when he sees Baekhyun seated just opposite of him.
With a coffee mug in his hand and a bag slung over his shoulder, Baekhyun looks as put together as he did over a month ago. The smile that Kyungsoo missed dearly is present, along with his overly styled hair and trademark sweater he wore the first time he met Kyungsoo at this coffee shop.
Casually, Baekhyun gazes at Kyungsoo from his seat, tentatively sipping on his drink. Kyungsoo sits silently, taking this all in. He can practically hear Baekhyun gulp down his drink in this silence.
“So…” Baekhyun drawls, “what’s new?”
His left eyebrow twitches out of irritation. “I haven’t seen you in over a month and you have the nerve to ask what’s new?”
Baekhyun shrugs, keeping his casualness steady. Kyungsoo grabs the closest thing he can find, which so happens to be a pen, and chucks it at Baekhyun. He manages to scrape his cheek, smiling when Baekhyun yelps and spills a drop of coffee onto his pant leg. For a moment, he frowns down at it, as if he’s waiting for the stain to suddenly disappear, but then he brushes his pants and blows on it.
“But really, how are you?” Baekhyun asks, angling himself to have a better view of Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo doesn’t have an answer, hardly recalling what he even did yesterday. “Fine.” He says instead. “I wrote.”
Baekhyun nods out of politeness, his teeth biting down onto his lower lip. “That’s good to hear.”
“I heard you’ve been writing yourself.”
Baekhyun’s mouth flips up. “I have. Just a bit.”
“About what?”
“Oh, not much.” Baekhyun begins to mess with his fingers, tapping them repeatedly onto his thighs. “I’ve been writing out someone I’ve been inspired by.” His eyes meet Kyungsoo’s, and he watches as his grin stretches across his face. Baekhyun leans forward, reaching out to poke Kyungsoo on his nose. “And it’s you.”
Kyungsoo’s face colors immediately, and Baekhyun coos, pinching his now pink-coated cheeks lovingly. Sputtering, Kyungsoo removes Baekhyun’s hand by slapping it away, asking, “What about your ‘rule’ though?”
Baekhyun laughs out loud, snorting once in an unruly manner in the middle of his cackle. “Rules are meant to be broken, Soo.” Kyungsoo’s heart jumps at his nickname, jumping with pure relief.
Baekhyun sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I’ll be frank here. I’m not very good at expressing myself all the time, at least not seriously.” Again, his hand reaches out to touch Kyungsoo’s cheek. One finger plucks away the stray eyelash resting on his cheekbone, before resting his hand to cup his cheek. “So I’m sorry for not letting you in. It’s hard for me, to suddenly trust someone again. But if it’s you…” Baekhyun inches closer, sitting on the very edge of the chair, “I think I could try again.”
Kyungsoo’s heart probably skips a beat, but he can’t tell because he finds himself being pulled in for a kiss. Baekhyun’s lips are soft and move against Kyungsoo’s chastely with his hand still cupping Kyungsoo’s cheek. Kyungsoo gives as well, pressing their lips together sweetly because it feels right, but his location clicks in his mind and slowly backs away.
Baekhyun’s eyes flutter back open, knocking his forehead playfully into Kyungsoo’s. He chuckles when Kyungsoo frowns but doesn’t attempt to put up a fight.
Kyungsoo inhales, “Please tell me that wasn’t some cheesy quote from a story you read.”
His teeth shine when he retorts, “I may have indulged myself in a few romance novels in this last month.”
“Romance isn’t your forte.” Kyungsoo quirks his eyebrow upward, teasing him a questionably.
“No,” Baekhyun easily agrees, swooping in to steal another peck on Kyungsoo’s lips, “but I did need to figure out how to make it up to you somehow. And sadly…” Baekhyun gestures to the two of them, the coffee stain on his pants, Kyungsoo’s shoeless feet, and their coffee breath, “…this was the best I could do.”
“For world class writer Byun Baekhyun, I am severely disappointed.”
Baekhyun responds, “I guess I’ll just have to make it up to you then.”
Laughing, Kyungsoo replies. “That you will.”
When Kyungsoo turns to look out the window, what he sees surprises him. Rain.
Huh.
Baekhyun waves a hand in front of him, distracting him out of his thought process. “Sorry to interrupt, but I have a proposition for you.”
He adjusts, shifting into a position that makes Kyungsoo believe he’s a writer. When he first heard of Byun Baekhyun, the writer, this is what he imagined him being like. Calm, collected, poised. But when Baekhyun cracks a smile, breaking his façade, Kyungsoo sees the Baekhyun he’s familiar with. The writer he loves. The person he loves.
“How would you, Do Kyungsoo, like to collaborate with noteworthy writer Byun Baekhyun?” Baekhyun proposes, eyes twinkling in mischief.
Baekhyun always baffles Kyungsoo with his ideas, but this likely tops them all. Kyungsoo matches his smile, thrilled and excited. “I think that sounds horribly ridiculous, but I’d be a fool to reject.”
Baekhyun nods agreeing. “You definitely would be. But you’d be my fool.” A moment later, Baekhyun is laughing as Kyungsoo uses his foot to shove Baekhyun back in the chair, hissing about how he is no one’s fool.
With minimal effort, Baekhyun pulls Kyungsoo to his feet, assisting him in putting his shoes and coat back on. After every button Baekhyun does, he stops to kiss Kyungsoo, murmuring affectionate words to him that causes Kyungsoo to turn redder than he has ever been before. As Kyungsoo protests, Baekhyun drags him along to the entrance and then into the rain.
Kyungsoo yelps as raindrops splatter onto his head, about ready to curse Baekhyun out when a hot pink umbrella shelters his head.
“You ready?” Although it’s pouring now, making the streets seem blurry, Baekhyun’s smile is easy to distinguish. Kyungsoo tries a Baekhyun, not giving him a response and instead chooses to pull Baekhyun through the streets.
And yeah, Kyungsoo thinks he’s ready.
÷
It turns out that working with Baekhyun is a more of labor-bearing task that Kyungsoo initially anticipated.
While Kyungsoo is usually the one who sits them both down, laying out their ideas in their shared notebook, Baekhyun is usually the one who coaxes Kyungsoo off of the couch with insistent kisses and aggressive cuddling.
It’s a wonder really how the two of them manage to turn in a draft that makes Junmyeon rave excitedly, swearing he’ll be the first to purchase a copy of their work.
It’s a simple story, a piece of fiction about two writers who fall in love. It’s cliché, but Baekhyun happily points out it’s based on a true story, and indeed it is.
On the final page of their novel, there are only a few words.
Dedicated to our matchmaker, the rain. Thank you.
A/N:
I started with one of your prompts and then it kind of combined with another prompt. It's probably not what you're expecting because it kind of became a mess but I hope you enjoy it. Also thanks to my betas and ravinator who believes you should listen to 2NE1's Missing You while reading this.
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