the fear you won't fall [Baekhyun/Lay]
the fear you won't fall
EXO | Baekhyun/Lay | PG-13 | 2,639w
Romance
It's a little scary to Baekhyun, how quickly they fell into this.
This is for my lovely wife, drainbamage954. This started as a Line drabble between the two of us and she pushes me and is like "you go write it!" So here it is. Sorry it took so long, but I hope it cheers you up. Ily and I miss you. ♥
the fear you won't fall
Yixing is kissing him again. Yixing is kissing him with his hand on the back of Baekhyun’s neck, fingers dancing on his nape, tugging him closer, reeling him in. Baekhyun leans in; trying to get more of that tingling feeling that he’s always thought would only be felt at the beginning, that proverbial spark. But with Yixing kissing him like this, holding him like he wants to do so forever, it's unending and it makes Baekhyun giddy yet scared at the same time. Because a jump seems inevitable.
It’s a little scary sometimes, how quickly they fell into this, how the stutter in Baekhyun’s chest continues every time he sees Yixing when he’s always thought it would fade soon, how just being with the other man makes him happy, how Yixing whispers how happy he is back, how he cares, feels, and promises to be there. It leaves him feeling lightheaded. With whispered promises and statements pressed to his lips and his skin, Baekhyun has never felt more alive than with Yixing there and he thinks that, if Yixing is going to catch him when he jumps, he might be able to hold onto the other just as tight. Because this is something he thinks he may never want to let go of as Yixing whispers against his lips words that send his heart sailing.
There was a time when jumping headfirst into anything even remotely close to a relationship was the farthest thing from Baekhyun's mind. Broken hearts tend to do that. You give your heart, willingly, openly, with hope and faith that the other will take good care of it, only to have it thrown away for someone or something else. When Baekhyun met Yixing, he had that sudden urge to ignore the introduction and run away. Because there was that jolt when they shook hands and Baekhyun immediately knew it was trouble. Yixing was going to be trouble. And he was right. Yixing had seemed to worm his way into his life without Baekhyun even noticing it. It was in the smallest of things, the tiny details, he wouldn’t normally bother paying attention to, like hanging out with him and his friends after work, or joining them for the movies. And then they’re hanging out in each other’s apartment every weekend. That space just keeps getting smaller and smaller until Baekhyun was suffocated by all the feelings he’s starting to have for the other man. Feelings he didn't know he had, feelings he didn't know could exist again. Feelings he wouldn’t have discovered again if Yixing never kissed him
Baekhyun pushes Yixing away. His fingertips tingle at the loss of the rough strands of Yixing’s hair. He sits back on the couch and watches the way Yixing’s chest rises and falls, hearing each husky breath falling between his lips, avoiding meeting his eyes for fear of giving in again.
“Baekhyun,” Yixing starts, but Baekhyun gets up and grabs his things.
“I have to go,” Baekhyun says abruptly, putting on his jacket and hurrying to the door. He jerkily pauses for a second, hand on the doorknob, as if expecting Yixing to come after him and stop him, but he shakes his head and walks out. It’s stupid to want to expect Yixing to hurry after him when he’s obviously running away. After all, why would you want someone who visibly doesn’t want to stay?
“You walked out,” is the first thing Kyungsoo says the moment Baekhyun walks into their apartment.
Baekhyun doesn’t say anything, merely takes time taking off his shoes and properly hanging his jacket in the closet. He knows what Kyungsoo is talking about, or who, just like Kyungsoo knows it is within his right to talk to Baekhyun about things he’s most uncomfortable talking about, like things that could possibly be heartbreaking. Like relationships. Like people. Like Yixing.
“I just got off the phone with him,” Kyungsoo explains with a sigh. “He wanted to make sure you got home safe.”
This still surprises Baekhyun, how Yixing seems to truly care about him and his well being, even if Yixing always asks about him all the time. The first time he and Yixing went out, they were on the streets until the wee hours of the morning that Yixing made it a point to walk Baekhyun home no matter how much he protested it wasn’t necessary.
The funny thing about Yixing is that he has this innate concern for people. He’s always helping someone after a stumble, guiding an elderly person across the street, giving pennies to the beggars. He’s also always texting Baekhyun funny things just when Baekhyun actually needs some cheering up. Baekhyun doesn’t understand it and he doesn’t understand Yixing. How can someone be so nice and accommodating? Especially to him.
“I’m fine,” Baekhyun says instead, walking to the kitchen for a glass of water. He stares at the fridge door when he closes it because a picture of him and Yixing is tacked on it. Baekhyun’s hair was still orange-ish then, which Yixing always said made him look like a little squash-a cute little squash. Baekhyun blushes at the memory and reaches up to take it down.
“Baekhyun, you and Yixing have been going out for a-“ Kyungsoo tries again.
“We’re not going out,” Baekhyun cuts him off, rather harshly that Kyungsoo’s eyes widen just a fraction more. “We’re not together. We’re just… he’s just…”
Baekhyun swallows uncomfortably. He’s not really sure what they are. Nothing has been discussed, no lines and boundaries have been defined, and Baekhyun really was fine with that. Until he started noticing more and more how they seemed to melding into people who acted like a couple, acted like they couldn’t get enough of each other. Not that Baekhyun can’t get enough of Yixing. He wouldn’t dare think like that again.
“Baekhyun,” Kyungsoo maintains concernedly, “Joonmyun was-“
“Don’t talk about him,” Baekhyun snaps, tone and eyes sharp. “Don’t,” he repeats when Kyungsoo opens his mouth to retort. “I mean it. I don’t want to hear it.”
Kyungsoo bites his lip for a second before deciding to speak up anyway. “What happened between you and him is not Yixing’s fault,” he states resolutely. “So don’t punish him.” He pauses for a second before meeting Baekhyun’s hard eyes. “It wasn’t your fault either,” he says, “so I don’t think you should be making things hard for yourself as well.”
Baekhyun turns around and walks away. He doesn’t really want to hear about his break-up with Joonmyun and how it was no one’s fault. Because that sounds like a cop out when it was clear that Joonmyun wasn’t in love with him.
Baekhyun takes a deep breath and pushes the door of the bookstore open. The bell above tinkles and he freezes up a bit as he stares at the empty counter, holding his breath as he waits for someone to come out from the backroom. He releases his breath through the tinges of disappointment when it’s Jongdae who comes out.
“Oh hey, Baekhyun,” Jongdae greets him absently, placing a stack of books wrapped with clear plastic on the counter. “What brings you here? Haven’t seen you around in a while.”
“It’s only been two weeks,” Baekhyun defends himself with a frown.
“Yup,” Jongdae agrees, shifting some of the books down from the stack. “And Yixing’s not here.”
“Oh?” Baekhyun starts, pretending that Yixing isn’t the reason he’s there in the first place. His eyes immediately flit towards the back most part of the store. “Well, I’ll just hang around and… read.”
Baekhyun can tell that Jongdae raises an eyebrow as he hums in acknowledgement without looking at him. He slips into the back part of the bookstore, in between shelves where no one really goes, where two people can sit on the floor, lean back on the books that no one reads and talk in low voices, reading each other fairytales and poetry.
Baekhyun puts his bag down before he’s sliding down to the floor, resting his back on Astronomical Physics Throughout the Ages. He takes a deep breath as he looks at the row of books across from him, at the empty space in front of him. It has only been two weeks. It’s a truth that feels like a lie because two weeks is only two weeks and yet… it feels like so, so much longer than that. More like a month-no, longer, like a couple of months. Baekhyun feels like it’s been too long a time since he’s last seen Yixing.
He’s avoided all his calls, deleted his text messages without even bothering to read them, skirted around routes that Baekhyun knew Yixing frequented, including not bothering to stop by the bookstore he’d always gone to every single day after work for the two years he’s been living near it. Baekhyun assured himself that it wasn’t because of Yixing that he’d avoided going there. It was because he was busy. Work had been piling up at the agency. There was a huge pile of proofs that he’d had to go to every single day, folders and folders of storyboards, line upon line of copy that he’d had to read through. But he had been busier before. This is the first time he’s gone out of his routine just because of something. Or someone.
Taking another deep breath, he leans forward. He pulls a thick medicinal herbs book out before slotting his hand into the empty space to feel for a much smaller, thinner book that he knows is there. Baekhyun pouts when he couldn’t feel for it. Frowning, he raises himself up on his knees to bend forward and actually look for it.
“Is this what you’re looking for?”
Baekhyun freezes at the all too familiar voice. It’s a voice that has spoken to him in smoothing tones, coaxing him out of his dark shell, eventually making him smile and laugh again. It’s a voice that’s hummed him to sleep, making feel comfortable and secure in a long time. He looks up, sitting back down on the floor. In Yixing’s hand is a small, black hardbound book.
“Yes,” Baekhyun lies with a steady voice. “I wanted to use it for a copy we’re working on.”
Yixing’s eyebrow quirks, but he smiles instead and hands the book of poems to Baekhyun. Baekhyun stares at the tattered book as he places it on his lap. Conscious of the fact that Yixing’s still standing there and watching him, he opens the book and flips through a couple of pages.
He’s waiting. Baekhyun is waiting. It has always been like this, Baekhyun coming into the bookstore, moving to the back, before Yixing joins him, sitting on the other side of the aisle, across from him. Yixing always just sits down, takes the book out and starts reading. Baekhyun, meanwhile, would lean his head back on the shelf, eyes closed, and would mouth along. He’s been reading poems long enough to have memorized a lot of them. He likes Yixing reading them, though, if only because he likes the way Yixing recites them, likes the way he enunciates, his tongue curling over vowels, making Baekhyun believe, making Baekhyun hope.
Yixing does sit down. But he sits beside Baekhyun, instead of across from him like he normally does. He takes the book from Baekhyun’s lap and opens it to page 56. Baekhyun’s eyes flicker down to catch the title just before Yixing starts reading. He closes his eyes.
“I like for you to be still
and you seem far away.
It sounds as though you were lamenting,
a butterfly cooing like a dove.
And you hear me from far away, and my voice does not reach you:
Let me come down to be still in your silence.”
Baekhyun’s eyes flutter open. He decidedly shifts in his seat to watch Yixing read. To hear Yixing.
“And let me talk to you with your silence
that is bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
You are like the night,
with its stillness and constellations.
Your silence is that of a star,
as remote and candid.”
Baekhyun’s attention is still rapt at Yixing, even when he’s stopped talking. Yixing’s eyes are almost glued to the page with how hard he’s still staring at it, reading the words quietly over and over again.
Baekhyun knows exactly what Yixing said. He can read between the lines. He’s not surprised that Yixing can as well. It is how they’ve functioned with each other all this time after all. But Baekhyun’s heart jumps, because, all this time, all throughout this whole thing, he is surprised to find that he’s relieved; relieved that Yixing understands, more than Baekhyun, what he really is feeling.
Yixing moves to close the book, but Baekhyun stops him. He shifts closer as he opens the book to the same page and urges for Yixing to continue reading.
“I like for you to be still:
it is as though you were absent,
distant and full of sorrow as though you had died.”
Baekhyun moves even closer to Yixing, their knees and thighs touching. His head falls gently onto Yixing shoulder, making Yixing pause in his recitation, but then he carries on like nothing happened. Baekhyun smiles.
“One word then, one smile, is enough.
And I am happy,
happy that it's not true.”
Baekhyun squeezes his eyes shut at the silence that follows. There are so many ways he’s contemplated about doing this, so many ways he’s already thought of a way out. But no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn’t take Yixing out of any equation.
“I know you’re scared,” Yixing starts softly, fingers pressed on the edges of the tattered book of poems. “I know that there are things you’d rather not get into right now because-“
“It’s not true,” Baekhyun interrupts because he cannot and will not let Yixing go through a whole speech of how Baekhyun is afraid to get into a relationship because some guy broke his heart a while ago. He doesn’t want Yixing to be involved in any way with his past. He doesn’t want their relationship to be affected by something that’s done.
“Baekhyun,” Yixing tries again.
“Yixing,” Baekhyun starts, shifting his head so his lips are brushing Yixing’s neck. “I’m here.” He takes a deep breath because this is it. This is the inevitable jump. “I know I may not seem like it. I may not even seem like I want to be, but… I’m here.”
Yixing is laughing, quietly, but he’s laughing and Baekhyun is jostled in his cozy position. “I know,” he says warmly and affectionately. He lifts his arm and wraps it around Baekhyun, hugging him closer. “Trust me, I know.”
And this time, it’s Baekhyun who’s kissing Yixing. It’s Baekhyun’s fingers that are dancing on Yixing’s neck, tugging him closer and reeling him in. Because he knows-he’s sure-that he wants this now, knows that there is no turning back. This isn’t just a spark. It’s an endless burning of passion that he’s pretty certain will be there between them for a long time. It makes Baekhyun tingle from his head to the tips of his toes.
Slowly, ever so tenderly, Yixing pulls slightly away, lifting Baekhyun’s face up, to look at him. There is a smile on Yixing’s face that Baekhyun knows is reflecting the one on his. Baekhyun had been wrestling with the obviousness of things between the two of them, the expectancy of a jump and a fall. Being in Yixing’s arms like this, being in his arms all this time, he realizes that he’s never really needed to be afraid at all. Because even at the time that Baekhyun was still worrying about everything, Yixing had already caught him.
*Poem is I like for you to be still by Pablo Neruda
Thank you to Karen and to kei17 for the read-through. :)
EXO | Baekhyun/Lay | PG-13 | 2,639w
Romance
It's a little scary to Baekhyun, how quickly they fell into this.
This is for my lovely wife, drainbamage954. This started as a Line drabble between the two of us and she pushes me and is like "you go write it!" So here it is. Sorry it took so long, but I hope it cheers you up. Ily and I miss you. ♥
the fear you won't fall
Yixing is kissing him again. Yixing is kissing him with his hand on the back of Baekhyun’s neck, fingers dancing on his nape, tugging him closer, reeling him in. Baekhyun leans in; trying to get more of that tingling feeling that he’s always thought would only be felt at the beginning, that proverbial spark. But with Yixing kissing him like this, holding him like he wants to do so forever, it's unending and it makes Baekhyun giddy yet scared at the same time. Because a jump seems inevitable.
It’s a little scary sometimes, how quickly they fell into this, how the stutter in Baekhyun’s chest continues every time he sees Yixing when he’s always thought it would fade soon, how just being with the other man makes him happy, how Yixing whispers how happy he is back, how he cares, feels, and promises to be there. It leaves him feeling lightheaded. With whispered promises and statements pressed to his lips and his skin, Baekhyun has never felt more alive than with Yixing there and he thinks that, if Yixing is going to catch him when he jumps, he might be able to hold onto the other just as tight. Because this is something he thinks he may never want to let go of as Yixing whispers against his lips words that send his heart sailing.
There was a time when jumping headfirst into anything even remotely close to a relationship was the farthest thing from Baekhyun's mind. Broken hearts tend to do that. You give your heart, willingly, openly, with hope and faith that the other will take good care of it, only to have it thrown away for someone or something else. When Baekhyun met Yixing, he had that sudden urge to ignore the introduction and run away. Because there was that jolt when they shook hands and Baekhyun immediately knew it was trouble. Yixing was going to be trouble. And he was right. Yixing had seemed to worm his way into his life without Baekhyun even noticing it. It was in the smallest of things, the tiny details, he wouldn’t normally bother paying attention to, like hanging out with him and his friends after work, or joining them for the movies. And then they’re hanging out in each other’s apartment every weekend. That space just keeps getting smaller and smaller until Baekhyun was suffocated by all the feelings he’s starting to have for the other man. Feelings he didn't know he had, feelings he didn't know could exist again. Feelings he wouldn’t have discovered again if Yixing never kissed him
Baekhyun pushes Yixing away. His fingertips tingle at the loss of the rough strands of Yixing’s hair. He sits back on the couch and watches the way Yixing’s chest rises and falls, hearing each husky breath falling between his lips, avoiding meeting his eyes for fear of giving in again.
“Baekhyun,” Yixing starts, but Baekhyun gets up and grabs his things.
“I have to go,” Baekhyun says abruptly, putting on his jacket and hurrying to the door. He jerkily pauses for a second, hand on the doorknob, as if expecting Yixing to come after him and stop him, but he shakes his head and walks out. It’s stupid to want to expect Yixing to hurry after him when he’s obviously running away. After all, why would you want someone who visibly doesn’t want to stay?
“You walked out,” is the first thing Kyungsoo says the moment Baekhyun walks into their apartment.
Baekhyun doesn’t say anything, merely takes time taking off his shoes and properly hanging his jacket in the closet. He knows what Kyungsoo is talking about, or who, just like Kyungsoo knows it is within his right to talk to Baekhyun about things he’s most uncomfortable talking about, like things that could possibly be heartbreaking. Like relationships. Like people. Like Yixing.
“I just got off the phone with him,” Kyungsoo explains with a sigh. “He wanted to make sure you got home safe.”
This still surprises Baekhyun, how Yixing seems to truly care about him and his well being, even if Yixing always asks about him all the time. The first time he and Yixing went out, they were on the streets until the wee hours of the morning that Yixing made it a point to walk Baekhyun home no matter how much he protested it wasn’t necessary.
The funny thing about Yixing is that he has this innate concern for people. He’s always helping someone after a stumble, guiding an elderly person across the street, giving pennies to the beggars. He’s also always texting Baekhyun funny things just when Baekhyun actually needs some cheering up. Baekhyun doesn’t understand it and he doesn’t understand Yixing. How can someone be so nice and accommodating? Especially to him.
“I’m fine,” Baekhyun says instead, walking to the kitchen for a glass of water. He stares at the fridge door when he closes it because a picture of him and Yixing is tacked on it. Baekhyun’s hair was still orange-ish then, which Yixing always said made him look like a little squash-a cute little squash. Baekhyun blushes at the memory and reaches up to take it down.
“Baekhyun, you and Yixing have been going out for a-“ Kyungsoo tries again.
“We’re not going out,” Baekhyun cuts him off, rather harshly that Kyungsoo’s eyes widen just a fraction more. “We’re not together. We’re just… he’s just…”
Baekhyun swallows uncomfortably. He’s not really sure what they are. Nothing has been discussed, no lines and boundaries have been defined, and Baekhyun really was fine with that. Until he started noticing more and more how they seemed to melding into people who acted like a couple, acted like they couldn’t get enough of each other. Not that Baekhyun can’t get enough of Yixing. He wouldn’t dare think like that again.
“Baekhyun,” Kyungsoo maintains concernedly, “Joonmyun was-“
“Don’t talk about him,” Baekhyun snaps, tone and eyes sharp. “Don’t,” he repeats when Kyungsoo opens his mouth to retort. “I mean it. I don’t want to hear it.”
Kyungsoo bites his lip for a second before deciding to speak up anyway. “What happened between you and him is not Yixing’s fault,” he states resolutely. “So don’t punish him.” He pauses for a second before meeting Baekhyun’s hard eyes. “It wasn’t your fault either,” he says, “so I don’t think you should be making things hard for yourself as well.”
Baekhyun turns around and walks away. He doesn’t really want to hear about his break-up with Joonmyun and how it was no one’s fault. Because that sounds like a cop out when it was clear that Joonmyun wasn’t in love with him.
Baekhyun takes a deep breath and pushes the door of the bookstore open. The bell above tinkles and he freezes up a bit as he stares at the empty counter, holding his breath as he waits for someone to come out from the backroom. He releases his breath through the tinges of disappointment when it’s Jongdae who comes out.
“Oh hey, Baekhyun,” Jongdae greets him absently, placing a stack of books wrapped with clear plastic on the counter. “What brings you here? Haven’t seen you around in a while.”
“It’s only been two weeks,” Baekhyun defends himself with a frown.
“Yup,” Jongdae agrees, shifting some of the books down from the stack. “And Yixing’s not here.”
“Oh?” Baekhyun starts, pretending that Yixing isn’t the reason he’s there in the first place. His eyes immediately flit towards the back most part of the store. “Well, I’ll just hang around and… read.”
Baekhyun can tell that Jongdae raises an eyebrow as he hums in acknowledgement without looking at him. He slips into the back part of the bookstore, in between shelves where no one really goes, where two people can sit on the floor, lean back on the books that no one reads and talk in low voices, reading each other fairytales and poetry.
Baekhyun puts his bag down before he’s sliding down to the floor, resting his back on Astronomical Physics Throughout the Ages. He takes a deep breath as he looks at the row of books across from him, at the empty space in front of him. It has only been two weeks. It’s a truth that feels like a lie because two weeks is only two weeks and yet… it feels like so, so much longer than that. More like a month-no, longer, like a couple of months. Baekhyun feels like it’s been too long a time since he’s last seen Yixing.
He’s avoided all his calls, deleted his text messages without even bothering to read them, skirted around routes that Baekhyun knew Yixing frequented, including not bothering to stop by the bookstore he’d always gone to every single day after work for the two years he’s been living near it. Baekhyun assured himself that it wasn’t because of Yixing that he’d avoided going there. It was because he was busy. Work had been piling up at the agency. There was a huge pile of proofs that he’d had to go to every single day, folders and folders of storyboards, line upon line of copy that he’d had to read through. But he had been busier before. This is the first time he’s gone out of his routine just because of something. Or someone.
Taking another deep breath, he leans forward. He pulls a thick medicinal herbs book out before slotting his hand into the empty space to feel for a much smaller, thinner book that he knows is there. Baekhyun pouts when he couldn’t feel for it. Frowning, he raises himself up on his knees to bend forward and actually look for it.
“Is this what you’re looking for?”
Baekhyun freezes at the all too familiar voice. It’s a voice that has spoken to him in smoothing tones, coaxing him out of his dark shell, eventually making him smile and laugh again. It’s a voice that’s hummed him to sleep, making feel comfortable and secure in a long time. He looks up, sitting back down on the floor. In Yixing’s hand is a small, black hardbound book.
“Yes,” Baekhyun lies with a steady voice. “I wanted to use it for a copy we’re working on.”
Yixing’s eyebrow quirks, but he smiles instead and hands the book of poems to Baekhyun. Baekhyun stares at the tattered book as he places it on his lap. Conscious of the fact that Yixing’s still standing there and watching him, he opens the book and flips through a couple of pages.
He’s waiting. Baekhyun is waiting. It has always been like this, Baekhyun coming into the bookstore, moving to the back, before Yixing joins him, sitting on the other side of the aisle, across from him. Yixing always just sits down, takes the book out and starts reading. Baekhyun, meanwhile, would lean his head back on the shelf, eyes closed, and would mouth along. He’s been reading poems long enough to have memorized a lot of them. He likes Yixing reading them, though, if only because he likes the way Yixing recites them, likes the way he enunciates, his tongue curling over vowels, making Baekhyun believe, making Baekhyun hope.
Yixing does sit down. But he sits beside Baekhyun, instead of across from him like he normally does. He takes the book from Baekhyun’s lap and opens it to page 56. Baekhyun’s eyes flicker down to catch the title just before Yixing starts reading. He closes his eyes.
“I like for you to be still
and you seem far away.
It sounds as though you were lamenting,
a butterfly cooing like a dove.
And you hear me from far away, and my voice does not reach you:
Let me come down to be still in your silence.”
Baekhyun’s eyes flutter open. He decidedly shifts in his seat to watch Yixing read. To hear Yixing.
“And let me talk to you with your silence
that is bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
You are like the night,
with its stillness and constellations.
Your silence is that of a star,
as remote and candid.”
Baekhyun’s attention is still rapt at Yixing, even when he’s stopped talking. Yixing’s eyes are almost glued to the page with how hard he’s still staring at it, reading the words quietly over and over again.
Baekhyun knows exactly what Yixing said. He can read between the lines. He’s not surprised that Yixing can as well. It is how they’ve functioned with each other all this time after all. But Baekhyun’s heart jumps, because, all this time, all throughout this whole thing, he is surprised to find that he’s relieved; relieved that Yixing understands, more than Baekhyun, what he really is feeling.
Yixing moves to close the book, but Baekhyun stops him. He shifts closer as he opens the book to the same page and urges for Yixing to continue reading.
“I like for you to be still:
it is as though you were absent,
distant and full of sorrow as though you had died.”
Baekhyun moves even closer to Yixing, their knees and thighs touching. His head falls gently onto Yixing shoulder, making Yixing pause in his recitation, but then he carries on like nothing happened. Baekhyun smiles.
“One word then, one smile, is enough.
And I am happy,
happy that it's not true.”
Baekhyun squeezes his eyes shut at the silence that follows. There are so many ways he’s contemplated about doing this, so many ways he’s already thought of a way out. But no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn’t take Yixing out of any equation.
“I know you’re scared,” Yixing starts softly, fingers pressed on the edges of the tattered book of poems. “I know that there are things you’d rather not get into right now because-“
“It’s not true,” Baekhyun interrupts because he cannot and will not let Yixing go through a whole speech of how Baekhyun is afraid to get into a relationship because some guy broke his heart a while ago. He doesn’t want Yixing to be involved in any way with his past. He doesn’t want their relationship to be affected by something that’s done.
“Baekhyun,” Yixing tries again.
“Yixing,” Baekhyun starts, shifting his head so his lips are brushing Yixing’s neck. “I’m here.” He takes a deep breath because this is it. This is the inevitable jump. “I know I may not seem like it. I may not even seem like I want to be, but… I’m here.”
Yixing is laughing, quietly, but he’s laughing and Baekhyun is jostled in his cozy position. “I know,” he says warmly and affectionately. He lifts his arm and wraps it around Baekhyun, hugging him closer. “Trust me, I know.”
And this time, it’s Baekhyun who’s kissing Yixing. It’s Baekhyun’s fingers that are dancing on Yixing’s neck, tugging him closer and reeling him in. Because he knows-he’s sure-that he wants this now, knows that there is no turning back. This isn’t just a spark. It’s an endless burning of passion that he’s pretty certain will be there between them for a long time. It makes Baekhyun tingle from his head to the tips of his toes.
Slowly, ever so tenderly, Yixing pulls slightly away, lifting Baekhyun’s face up, to look at him. There is a smile on Yixing’s face that Baekhyun knows is reflecting the one on his. Baekhyun had been wrestling with the obviousness of things between the two of them, the expectancy of a jump and a fall. Being in Yixing’s arms like this, being in his arms all this time, he realizes that he’s never really needed to be afraid at all. Because even at the time that Baekhyun was still worrying about everything, Yixing had already caught him.
*Poem is I like for you to be still by Pablo Neruda
Thank you to Karen and to kei17 for the read-through. :)