[exo] growing pains (1/1)
Growing Pains (1/1)
Sehun/girl!Tao
9,420 words
They say senior year of high school is the best time to fall in love.
Written for zitaomfg for the Totaolly fic fest. To my dear recipient, I hope you enjoy this!
growing pains
“Have you ever been in love?” Tao asks him one day. It’s raining outside, the cold air seeping through the small crack on the glass window. It’s one of those rare days of the summer when the weather decides to joke around.
Tao has her feet up against the windowsill, staring blankly outside. Sehun wonders, briefly, if he should answer the question seriously or if Tao’s just joking around like she usually does.
He opts for something safe instead.
“What do you mean?” Sehun asks, stealing a glance.
“Like,” Tao turns to look at him, “you know, in the movies.”
“Are you in love?” Sehun throws back the question, voice teasing and lips tugging at the corners.
“Don’t be stupid,” Tao replies hotly. “You’ve known me for forever and you know I’ve never been in - anything.”
“Then there’s your answer. You’ve known me for forever, too, and you know I don’t believe in that.”
Tao shrugs and a small section of her hair falls to her shoulder. If Sehun exerts enough effort he could reach up and tuck the strands back to her bun but the weather is making him lazy. He repositions on the couch instead, head lying on the armrest.
“What’s up with the question anyway?” Sehun yawns.
“Nothing,” Tao frowns and traces the path of the raindrop against the glass window. Sehun knows that look, but he doesn’t say anything. He offers his bag of chips instead, hand extended out just enough for Tao’s reach.
“Want some?”
Tao grins and grabs the whole bag for herself.
---
Sehun was seven when the Huang’s had moved in next door with a lot of fanfare. It was a summer weekend, the sun hot and sweltering, and Sehun peeked through the window as their new neighbors carried boxes inside the house, shirts sticking to their backs.
That was the first time Sehun caught a glimpse of Tao: sitting on the sidewalk, hair cut short above the ears and wearing loose fitting shorts. When the kid glanced up at Sehun, he ducked down the window, blood thundering in his ears.
‘A boy,’ Sehun thought. He swallowed the fear down his throat even though his palms were already getting clammy. ‘He looked like he was gonna punch me.’
He didn’t dare to sneak in another glance.
---
Senior year is the most memorable time for most high school students, or at least that’s what people say. For Sehun, it feels the same as any other school year. He gets up in the morning, dresses in his uniform, and goes next door to eat a traditional Chinese breakfast in Tao’s dining table. He can hear Tao’s mother shouting at Tao that they’re going to be late. Sehun doesn’t care if that means he gets to have Tao’s share of breakfast.
“So?” Tao appears in front of him and twirls. “What do you think?”
Brown, that’s all that Sehun can see as the sunlight filters through the window and reflects on Tao’s head.
“It’s nice,” Sehun says, non-committal.
“Just nice?” Tao sits on the chair beside him and scoots closer while stealing a piece of fried egg off Sehun’s plate. She’s going to regret all that grease on her hand and complain to Sehun later, but for now she’s happily chewing off the sides of the egg white, softly curled hair framing her face.
“Just nice.” Sehun rolls his eyes. “If you were looking for a comprehensive review, you should have asked one of your girlfriends. When did you do that anyway? Yesterday morning you still had your old hair.”
“Last night,” Tao replies. “And this is why I didn’t bring you with me. You have horrible taste!”
“I’m a guy. What do you expect?” He sets his chopsticks down and grabs his bag off the other chair. “Come on, we’re going to be late.”
Tao’s still sitting, the piece of egg yolk back on Sehun’s plate. She’s sulking on her chair and Sehun can already feel the protests ready to spill out of her mouth.
“Fine,” Sehun says, arms raised in surrender. “It’s cute.”
“You’re just saying that to appease me.” She purses her lips and crosses her arms against her chest.
“Partly,” he replies truthfully. “But okay, I admit, it looks good on you.” It does look good, the light bouncing off the newly dyed brown strands more readily than Tao’s previous dark hair. But even so, Sehun’s already missing the deep black.
“Can we just go now, your highness?” Sehun prods Tao’s socked toes with his own. “Your cuteness?”
“You’re so gross!” Tao yelps, but she’s grinning. “Okay my dear knight, fetch me my carriage.”
Sehun shakes his head and makes gagging sounds, but he still does what he’s told.
On the way to school, Sehun releases his hold on one of the bike’s clutch and ruffles Tao’s hair as he passes her. It’s soft and smooth, strands sparkling under the daylight, and she swats his hand away with a laugh.
---
“Yah!” Jongin shouts as he slaps Sehun’s back just when they’re parking their bikes. “What happened? I don’t see you for a month and suddenly you’re a giant.”
Puberty had been gracious to Sehun over the past summer, adding a few more centimeters to his height than what is normally appropriate. His shoulders are broader, too, giving fullness and breadth to his previously lanky frame.
With this newly acquired body comes with a certain awareness in Sehun making him mindful of his longer limbs and height. He maneuvers Jongin’s arm around him, careful not to accidentally elbow Tao or else she’ll give him a good beating.
“Did he?” Tao stands up and gives him a once over. “I never noticed.”
“It’s because you guys see each other every day.” Jongin explains and looks at Tao. “Nice hair.”
“Just nice?” Tao asks, and Jongin opens his mouth to reply, but Tao raises her hand to cut him off. “Nevermind. I already know what you’re going to say.”
She gives a sidelong glance at Sehun, who beams at her and turns to Jongin instead.
“And whose fault is it anyway that we didn’t get to see each other?”
Jongin shrugs, grinning. “Can’t help it. My favorite hyung was back in town during the summer.”
“You mean your hopelessly one-sided puppy crush,” Tao says as they start walking to their class.
“IT’S NOT A PUPPY CRUSH,” Jongin shouts. “AND IT’S NOT ONE-SIDED.”
“Sure,” Sehun replies. “Except your sentences just negated each other.”
“Stop.” Jongin pauses mid-step and starts massaging his temple. “It’s too early for you to tag team against me. I can’t win over your ten? eleven? years of telepathic friendship. Where are the others anyway?”
“Eleven,” Tao corrects him. “And Chanyeol and Baekhyun are probably late as usual.”
She scans the hallway and eyes a group of girls by the window who Sehun noticed had been looking at them since they got there.
“Let’s just go,” she says, looping her arms along Jongin’s and Sehun’s and proceeds to drag them to their classroom. “I don’t wanna be late like those two.”
---
The first time Sehun and Tao actually met was when Mr. and Mrs. Oh dragged their children over to the Huang’s. It was an early Sunday morning, when people were out sweeping the streets outside their houses and sprinkling water on their plants. The Huang’s were one of those people and the Oh seniors, being naturally curious people, went over to greet them, which inevitably led to introducing their children to each other.
Huang Zitao was the name of the Huang’s only child, and as Mrs. Huang went inside the house to pick up her child, Sehun felt his gut churning at the thought of being punched on their first meeting. He didn’t even know why, but that was the general vibe he got from the other. Tall, sharp eyes, dark hair.
When Zitao stepped out of the house, he let out a gasp. The kid was wearing a dress, boy cut hair pinned on one side with a flower clip.
“A girl,” Sehun muttered mostly to himself. Zitao only glared at him harder.
Back then, Sehun never thought he’d end up being close to the kid he mistook as a boy only to get smacked right over the head, and that this occurrence would continue on for years.
---
“Stop daydreaming.” Tao gives a soft kick to Sehun’s leg. “There won’t be any food left if we don’t get there on time.”
“The guys will save us some.” Sehun stands up and stretches his arms above his head feeling his spine clicking in place. First day of classes is usually the most boring.
“Jongin’s right,” Tao mutters, staring at him.
“Hmm?” Sehun turns to look at her.
“You really did grow a bit,” Tao replies and measures herself against Sehun, side by side.
“I’m a growing boy,” Sehun grins, bumping his shoulder against Tao’s. “And you just stopped growing.”
“Yah,” Tao retorts. “Don’t be cocky now. I said just a bit. Besides, it wouldn’t look good for a girl to be taller than most guys anyway.”
“You used to love being taller than me,” Sehun scoffs. “You said the angle was good so you can hit my head easier.”
“Don’t remind me,” Tao shushes him. “Real ladies don’t act that way.”
“I don’t see one here,” Sehun mumbles and smirks.
Tao raises her arm and swipes at Sehun.
“What was it that you said again?” Sehun catches her hand and mimics Tao’s voice. “Real ladies don’t act that way.”
“Aish,” Tao hisses and tries to shrug off his grasp, but Sehun squeezes her hand, face breaking out into a full smile.
“And here I thought you were rushing to get to lunch,” he says as he tugs Tao out the door.
“Then, my dear knight, lead the way.”
---
The first time Tao blessed (or cursed) him with the knight nickname was after they had just finished watching a gazillion Disney princess movies. Sehun was forced to sit through it with the combined forces of his noona and Tao. After the fifth movie, Tao had declared him to be her knight in shining armor since she was saving up the prince position for her future husband.
She sighed dreamily along with Sehun’s noona, Jihye, while they picked the next torture to put Sehun through. If Tao and Sehun were like peas in a pod then Tao and Jihye were like idol and fan since Jihye was the only other female figure in Tao’s life close to their age. Tao followed whatever Jihye did, which included an unfortunate amount of romanticism in the form of romance novels, movies and stories.
When Sehun’s noona experienced her first heartbreak, Sehun and Tao were both there to witness it. Tao cried with Jihye and consoled her while Sehun grunted in response, too young and awkward to give any real comfort to what he called “girl feelings”.
That was just the first of many. By Jihye’s fourth failed relationship, Sehun vowed to never fall in love. What good was it when all it did was to hurt people in the end? Every time he thought about love, he could imagine his noona’s crying face with Tao beside her, tears in their eyes.
Love, he thought, only ended in happily ever after in movies and maybe for one person in every one thousand. Real life proved to be otherwise, and Sehun didn’t want to end up being the bad guy that would hurt the female lead before the ending credits.
Jihye’s venture into finding her One True Love had the opposite effect on Tao, however. For every downfall, it just spurred Tao even more to be a hopeless romantic.
“Don’t give up on love, Tao.” Sehun had overheard his noona tell her before when they were sitting outside on the porch. “Once you find it, don’t let it go because it will be worth it. As a great philosopher once said, ‘You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.’”
“I won’t,” Tao had whispered, almost in reverence. Sehun could almost imagine the stars in her eyes. “And which philosopher said that?”
“Dr. Seuss,” Jihye had replied with a laugh.
A month after, Jihye moved to an apartment near her university after a bad breakup from someone in their neighborhood and all Sehun could think of was a passage from a comic book he was reading:
Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.
Love was, for Sehun, a horrible thing.
It still is.
---
Over the course of the next few weeks after the start of their senior year, Sehun has received several love letters and confessions. The first one took him by surprise, the second one even more surprising, but by the tenth one the charm has worn off.
“I’m sorry,” Sehun begins this familiar line, “but I don’t feel the same way about you and I don’t have any plans of dating anyone either.”
Better to receive the heartbreak now than later, he reasons out.
“I see…” the girl says. She said her name is Erin, a previous classmate from their younger years.
“And this has nothing to do with Tao?” She adds.
“Tao?” Sehun asks, confused. “Huang Zitao?”
“Yeah…” Erin murmurs. “I’m not getting rejected because you’re interested in her or anything right? Since you two are always together…”
“No!” Sehun quickly denies it. “I mean, of course not. Tao and I are just best friends.”
Speaking of Tao, Sehun is reminded of how they were supposed to meet up after class today. That was ten minutes ago. He inwardly groans and clenches his eyes together and when he opens them he catches a glimpse of brown hair turn a corner.
“Thank you for liking me,” Sehun says formally. “But I’m sorry that I can’t return your affections.” He bows a bit at her and quickens his pace as he turns a corner.
“How long have you been here?”
Tao’s leaning on the wall, her bag on one shoulder and Sehun’s bag by her feet. There’s something with the way Tao looks at him that makes him feel uneasy. Her eyes look slightly glassy, but it might just be by the way the sunlight by the window across the hallway hits her eyes.
Tao smiles at him, slowly, and says, “Long enough.”
---
“Are you going to eat that?”
Yes, Sehun wants to say, but Tao’s already reaching over to grab the remaining noodles of his jjajangmyeon. She twists it on her chopsticks and looks at him seemingly waiting for his approval.
“Go ahead,” Sehun replies and shakes his head. “I don’t even know why you love umma’s jjajangmyeon so much when aunt makes the more authentic one.”
Tao slurps on the noodles loudly and it makes Sehun smile. This feels more like the Tao he knows compared to that strange moment they had earlier and the silent walk back home.
“I like the Korean style better. It’s sweeter? Maybe I’ve finally acquired that Korean taste, heh.”
Sehun remembers how picky Tao was when she just arrived from China. It had been the cause of their biggest (and pettiest) arguments when Sehun wanted to eat Korean food and Tao would pick to go to a Chinese place instead. Just one of the things that made him wonder how they were even friends in the first place.
“So,” Tao begins. “What’s up with you and Erin?”
“Who?”
“The girl who confessed to you earlier!” Tao makes a swipe at his forehead with her chopsticks but Sehun deftly dodges it.
“What’s there to ask about?” Sehun leans back on his chair and stretches his legs under the table. “It’s not like you didn’t hear it.”
“Who knows, maybe you rejected her but then you’re thinking the opposite.” There are still some noodles left on Tao’s bowl that she’s swirling them around aimlessly.
“Unlike you girls, us guys actually mean ‘no’ when we say it.”
The side of Tao’s mouth is stained with jjajangmyeon and Sehun reaches over to wipe it off with his thumb.
“Don’t be sexist now.” Tao chides but the ends of her lips are tugging.
“I’m just saying.” Sehun rolls his eyes. “Besides, I’ve already got you. Getting a girlfriend is like asking for twice the headache.”
Tao shoves him over. “Shut up,” she says but she’s smiling. All teeth and crinkly eyes. Young and alive.
Sehun shoves her back. “And what’s with that creepy smile?”
“I already said shut up, Sehun.”
She doesn’t say anything more after that. Just returns to Sehun’s bowl of jjajangmyeon and finishes it off with a smile.
---
If Sehun’s going to be honest with himself, Tao has been this huge constant headache for him. It’s just through years of conditioning (and suffering) that Sehun has finally perfected the Art of Eternal Patience.
The multiple events that transpired over their years of friendship (and probably non-friendship) have somehow made Sehun fit in with Tao’s personality and Tao to him like two pieces of a whole. If he is to think of one major event though, it might have been the day of his circumsion:
“You’re a man now!” Tao exclaimed, giggling. She had just burst inside his room and invaded the last remnant of his privacy.
Sehun groaned. In his head, this was worst case scenario #1.
“How did you even find out? I made umma and noona promise not to tell. Especially you.”
“I’m hurt,” Tao clutched at her chest but she was grinning. “Besides, it’s easy. It’s summer and boys our age never get sick unless it’s that.”
Tao sat down on the bed and Sehun winced at the impact. “So how does it feel?”
“Shut up.” Sehun growled.
“Do you feel more like a man now?” Tao continued.
“I feel like sleeping. Quietly. Alone. In Peace.”
“Come on,” Tao urged. “This is an important rite of passage for you. I mean, after this you’re supposed to be ready to fall in love now.”
“And who’s feeding you all that crap?” Sehun looked at her oddly.
“Jihye-unnie.”
Sehun sighed. “Just go away. Do your girly things.”
“No way.” Tao grinned devilishly and started climbing up the bed. “I wanna see it.”
“What the ---” Sehun stopped when he felt her fumbling at the bedsheets and -
“Yah!! Watch where you’re touc--- HUANG ZITAO!!!!”
And that was worst case scenario #2. Personal space seemed non-existent after that.
---
“So? What was that about?” They’re walking down the aisle of fresh produce and doing their families’ grocery shopping when Sehun asks the question.
He’s referring to the scene he chanced upon when he was looking for Tao earlier after their classes ended. She was with three other girls from another class and they seemed to have been engaged in an intense talk. Tao had her scary expression on, the one that she only uses when she’s in trouble. But the situation had diffused when they saw Sehun approach them and the girls had quickly gone away after greeting Sehun their goodbye’s.
“Nothing,” Tao replies. She turns around from where she’s examining a basket of strawberries and brushes imaginary lint off Sehun’s shoulder. “There’s just been too many pesky flies flying around you lately.”
“Zitao…” Sehun gives him the look.
“What?” Tao huffs. She tightens her hold on the Huang’s grocery list while Sehun has his own. Their families like to pair them together using the logic that they can at least maximize the “buy one, take one” offers in the grocery and just share it between them.
“They were the ones who asked me to go with them,” Tao says as if that explains everything.
Sehun shakes his head. “Don’t get into trouble on our last year in high school. I don’t want to hear it from Aunt and Uncle and my parents.”
“Are you siding with them?” Tao asks admonishingly. “And I’ve never gotten us into trouble!”
Sure, Sehun wants to say, but he’s pretty sure that his face is telling that to Tao right now.
“Okay, so maybe there was that incident back in sixth grade…” Tao concedes.
It’s not just that incident back in sixth grade. Through their history of friendship, Tao has gotten into several fights, both silly and righteous. It’s actually through a fight that their friendship was made.
It was during the first three months when the Huangs first moved in that Sehun got into trouble with the neighborhood bullies. It was raining hard that day and one of them had pushed Sehun down on the mud when Tao happened to pass by. She was wearing a dress and holding an umbrella and a bag of oranges.
The next moment went like a blur, but the next time Sehun came around, the other boys were either fleeing the scene or down on the mud with him. Tao stood in front of him, white dress wet and splattered with mud stains, broken umbrella and scattered oranges lying on the ground.
“Are you okay?” Tao asked in stilted Korean. Sehun was surprised to find her voice soft and high pitched. Not at all like a boy’s.
Sehun can’t remember what he said back then, but he remembers taking Tao’s offered hand and walking home together.
Eleven years down the road, he’s still holding on.
---
Monday to Thursday lunch is usually spent inside the cafeteria, but Friday lunch is something of a tradition to their group where they spend it out on a certain grassy spot under the tree of their school. It’s right after their gym class, too, so it feels nice to just lie on the ground and stretch after straining their bodies over menial, physical tasks.
It’s usually around this time that they also start talking about fifty different topics at the same time. Last week had been about university entrance exams and street food and what’s the weirdest thing they’ve ever eaten (“snake,” Tao had replied), but today’s topic is about love.
Unfortunately, for Sehun, he’s stuck with the constant nagging of the combined forces of Jongin, Chanyeol and Baekhyun asking him about his ideal type.
“I don’t have any because I don’t plan on falling in love in the first place,” Sehun says.
“It’s because you’re not supposed to plan it, dummy.” Tao retorts. “It’s just going to happen.”
“Says the hopeless romantic.” Sehun side-eyes her.
Tao opens her mouth for a comeback but Jongdae interrupts them. “But if you were, hypothetically speaking, to fall in love, what would she be like?”
Sehun puts his sandwich down and thinks over the question. He hasn’t really consciously thought about this before. Maybe just once or twice, but mostly in passing whenever he watched romantic movies with Tao or Jihye-noona.
“On a purely physical level, someone attractive, I guess.” Sehun answers.
Jongin snorts. “Isn’t that what everybody wants? Give us something more specific.”
He takes another moment to think it over and feels eyes settling on him. When he glances at its direction, it’s Tao and she’s listening attentively.
“I guess,” Sehun begins, pondering. “I’d like someone who can make me laugh and understands me.”
“You mean like Tao,” Chanyeol grins. “Except not Tao.”
Baekhyun smacks him over the head. “Shut up.”
“What?” Chanyeol asks. “But it’s true.”
“Right,” Tao says. She gazes at Sehun, smiling softly. “Of course.”
It’s the first time Sehun’s seen that expression on her. It reminds him of that time he caught her listening on his rejection of the girl from before, but this one feels more intense by tenfold but also muted at the same time. He doesn’t know where to begin to understand it.
---
It’s been a long and tiring day for Sehun and all he wants to do is curl up like a cat in his bed and sleep for a gazillion years. That doesn’t happen, of course, because Tao drags him off to the park near their houses to study “in this amazingly perfect weather.”
The first thing he does when he gets there is plop on the chair and rest his head on the table. At least Tao’s right about the weather - it is the perfect time to go outside and sleep.
He can hear her arranging her study materials right beside where his head is resting and the background noise lulls him further to sleep. Twenty, maybe thirty minutes pass with his eyes closed, the sunlight touching his eyelids.
“Sehun?” Tao asks very softly. It’s almost a whisper. “Sehun-ah?”
He doesn’t respond. Everything feels heavy and lazy right now. He’s in between that plane of wakefulness and dreaming, and he knows if he opens his mouth now he’s going to lose that.
Instead, he feels fingers thread through his hair. They’re soft fingers, the touches gentle, almost gingerly. He knows they’re Tao’s because who else could it be? He just doesn’t know why. Maybe it’s one of Tao’s impulsive, spur of the moment actions that she’s seen on TV. He feels the fingers trail down to his nape, feathering the baby hairs growing there. And then he hears someone inhale-
“Are you sniffing me?”
Sehun feels Tao stop her ministrations.
“I’m not!”
He turns his head around so that he’s facing Tao. She’s back to her books, but Sehun knows she’s not reading because her eyes never leave the same spot.
He grins lazily, teasingly. “What are you, a dog?”
“Do I look like a dog?” Tao counters. Sehun suddenly finds himself with the imaginary image of Tao with cute fluffy ears and a hyperactive wagging tail and he bursts out laughing. When he comes down from it and opens his eyes, Tao’s frowning at him and looking hurt.
“Sometimes I don’t even know if you know I’m a girl,” Tao says as she starts packing up her things.
“Of course I know,” Sehun scoffs, indignant.
“You know,” Tao says quietly, “but do you see me as one?”
Sehun doesn’t know why but he feels irritated with the question. It’s almost like Tao’s accusing him of being a bad friend.
“Why are you even asking me this?”
“Nevermind,” Tao replies, shaking her head. “Forget I asked.” By the time she’s finished saying that, she’s already packed and heading back home. Sehun’s left sitting at the park, head still resting on the table as he watches Tao’s back shrink further away from him.
---
Cooking class is probably one of the worst classes that Sehun has to deal with. Today’s task is baking a cake and his randomly selected group has decided on a chocolate cake, which is becoming more and more visually unappetizing. He tries to salvage it by covering it with cream, which doesn’t seem to be working since his big hands don’t have the finesse needed to apply it as sparingly and stylistically as possible.
Sehun searches for the other girls in his team only to find them flirting it up with the new teacher’s assistant that was recently assigned to their school. Him and Jongin have an ongoing bet that Kim-seonsaengnim is actually a chaebol going by his looks and mannerisms. Even his name sounds rich: Kim Junmyeon.
The teacher’s assistant said that they could just call him Junmyeon-hyung since he’s only a couple of years older, but Sehun refuses to. He’s going by his own principle that a man with that face and social skills cannot be trusted. He squints at the girl beside Kim-seonsaengnim who confessed to him just over a week ago but is now all over the new assistant.
Girls, Sehun sighs, and stops trying to put even more cream to their monster cake. He inspects it again and arrives to a conclusion: it’s a disaster.
“Sehun-ah,” Sehun hears Tao call out his name. She’s coming over to his table and holding a beautiful strawberry adorned chocolate cake with a few pieces cut out already.
Sehun groans. “Why couldn’t I have been in your team?” Tao’s always been gifted when it comes to baking.
She grins and cuts out a small piece for Sehun. “This is for you.”
Sehun quickly takes a bite out of it and moans loudly. “I’ve died and have gone to heaven.”
Tao nudges him with her elbow and says, “You’re overreacting,” but she’s glowing, smile spread out from one end of her face to another.
“I’m not,” Sehun says, just as Kim-seonsaengnim says the same thing. “He’s not.”
Tao whirls around and Kim-seonsaengnim is behind her, holding on to a bigger piece of cake that Tao’s group had submitted for grading.
“It’s really good. The layers of cake are very soft and moist, and the filling and icing have this subtly bittersweet taste that goes well with the tangy sweetness of the strawberries. The visual aspect was also not disregarded. Great job, Zitao.”
“Uhh,” Tao mumbles, “thank you.”
Sehun squints at Tao. Is that a flush creeping up her cheeks? He continues to observe their exchange as Tao bows a bit at Kim-seonsaengnim as a way of saying thanks just as the teacher’s assistant goes to another table to talk with the students.
“What?” Tao asks when she noticed Sehun looking at her.
Sehun shrugs and grabs her hand instead and asks for her help to save his team’s cake.
“That’s cheating,” Tao says, but she’s already chopping up various pieces of fruits to decorate the cake with.
---
Tao seems to quickly warm up to Kim-seonsaengnim after their initial interaction. Sehun notices how she studies extra hard for the subjects he’s assisting on and volunteers to do extra tasks that sometimes makes her come home later and disrupts their tradition of walking home together.
Today is one of those days as Tao exits their classroom holding on to a stack of notebooks that they passed in class.
“You guys go ahead,” Tao says as she adjusts the paper on her arms. “I still need to drop these off.”
Sehun wants to ask if she needs any help but Baekhyun beats him to it. “Do you need help with that?”
“Nah, I can handle this.” Tao grins and glances at Baekhyun’s arm. “You probably can’t carry this weight anyway.”
“Yah!” Baekhyun protests but Tao’s already maneuvered her way into the crowd.
Their group starts walking to the exit just as Sehun catches a flurry of movement in his periphery. He turns and sees Kim-seonsaengnim helping Tao pick up the notebooks that fell to the floor.
Sehun picks up Tao’s voice over the background noise of the other students milling about as she says, “thank you.” He wants to go and help, but he stops as Kim-seonsaengnim tells Tao that he’s going back to the faculty lounge so it’s best that they share the stack.
He watches as they chat down the hall on their way to the office with Kim-seonsaengnim carrying more than half of the notebooks.
---
Exam season is almost here again so that means logging in longer hours in the library during the days that they don’t have classes. Their parents have kicked them out because they reason out that Sehun and Tao would be too tempted to sleep in or too distracted by other things that doesn’t involve studying if they stayed inside the house. So the library is the answer to their parents’ dilemma.
They’ve been here for almost two hours now with about a billion books just between the two of them. They have been quiet for the most part, but Sehun’s already reaching that breaking point of his sanity where he has to talk to someone or else he might just throw something.
He looks up and stops. The library has high windows made up of multicolored stained glass. It’s the peak of the day just when the sun is directly up in the sky and it goes through the windows creating a myriad of colored lights right where Tao is. She glows with it.
Her hair is disheveled and it forms an almost halo around her. It looks even lighter now than before and Sehun can see the growing dark roots. There’s a growing itch on his palms that’s urging him to pet Tao’s head, smooth down her hair and maybe even comb his fingers through it, but he clamps it down.
Tao seems to notice him staring because she tilts her head at him in a questioning gaze.
“What are you reading?” Sehun tries to calm his nerves.
Tao grins and shows him the cover of her book. It’s a romance novel, which makes Sehun groan in disappointment
“I thought we’re supposed to be here to study?”
Tao rests her chin on her hands and smiles. “I thought that instead of staying here and making myself go insane, I’d rather just read a book I like. Don’t tell me you weren’t going mad yourself.”
“I was,” Sehun admits and tsks. “You know me too well.”
“That’s an understatement,” Tao says and angles her head to the right. Some strands of her hair falls over her face and the way she’s grinning at him makes Sehun think of how this expression fits her so well.
He feels the itch come back tenfold. He wants to lean over and touch her, and he wonders if Tao can read his thoughts at this moment.
---
“What happened?” Tao laughs beside him. They’re by the outdoor faucet near the gym and Sehun’s bent over trying to wash the ketchup stain off his school uniform.
“Nothing,” Sehun grumbles. It’s something that he’d rather forget immediately. “Just bumped into some idiots in the cafeteria.”
“Here, let me,” Tao says as she takes over the cleaning.
Sehun watches her from the side as she adds more soap to his shirt and puts it under the running water, foam building up. The truth is he overheard some guys from another class talking about Tao earlier when she stepped out of the gym.
They were making suggestive and lewd remarks while eating their sandwiches and Sehun couldn’t help bumping a little too hard on them, spilling their drinks and food down their uniforms and into the floor.
He didn’t even bother saying sorry. He just marched straight down to their meeting place and that was only when he noticed that some of the ketchup got to him, too.
“Aigoo,” Tao says, distracting him from his thoughts. “Are you a baby? Making such a mess out of your uniform.”
She holds up his clean but wet shirt and smiles at Sehun. “There you go. Just pop it under the hand dryer in the restroom before you put it on.”
“Thanks.” Sehun smiles back. “And you need to do something about that uniform.”
“What’s wrong with our gym uniform?” Tao twirls around. Her shorts are hiked up higher than usual and her gym shirt is twisted to a knot to fit her upper body closely.
“That’s not how you wear that thing,” Sehun replies grumpily. He unties the knot on her shirt and pulls down her shorts for a bit then examines his work.
“Much better.”
There’s a blush creeping up on Tao’s cheeks and she punches him lightly on the shoulder. “Such a grandpa.”
---
The next time they have their gym class, it’s divided between the boys and the girls with the girls playing volleyball and the boys shooting hoops.
Tao’s off to the side with a group of girls plotting out their game. She’s wearing her gym uniform the same way again and so do the other girls. Sehun feels a stab of annoyance and dribbles the ball a bit harder than he should and it bounces off his grasp. Jongin, who’s playing for the other team, catches it and laughs as he runs towards the goal.
“Yo man, focus!” Chanyeol nudges him at the side as he passes by. Baekhyun gives him a pat on the back, which Sehun thinks might be a bit more sympathetic.
The game continues with Sehun being distracted and Jongin laughing his ass off because of him. He doesn’t even know what’s bothering him, but it stays right there at the back of his head.
They get a five-minute break just as the girl’s volleyball game does and he walks over to Tao’s side to let off some steam. He stops when he sees Tao jog over to Kim-seonsaengnim and starts talking to him animatedly.
Sehun turns on his heel instead and bumps into someone.
“What’s with the long face?” Baekhyun asks, rubbing his nose that collided with Sehun’s shoulder.
“Nothing,” Sehun replies gruffly.
“Doesn’t look like nothing to me,” Baekhyun says. He peers over Sehun to the girls’ side. “Did you get into a fight with Tao?”
“No.” Sehun frowns. “What makes you think that?”
“I don’t know,” Baekhyun and makes flapping motions with his hands. “You’ve been acting weird lately.”
“ME?” Sehun gapes at him. “It’s more like Tao’s the one being odd lately. I mean, look at her. What’s with the get-up?”
“What’s wrong with what she’s wearing? That’s our uniform.” Baekhyun glances at Tao for a while and tilts his head. “I think she’s becoming more cute lately.”
Sehun balks at the comment.
“Okay,” Baekhyun grins. “So maybe she’s acting more girly nowadays. But I think it’s perfectly normal for a teenage girl to be that way.”
Sehun shrugs casually. “I don’t know. She just feels…different.”
“Teenage girls tend to be like that when they have a crush,” Baekhyun comments noncommittally.
Sehun stops and whirls around to face Baekhyun. “Zitao has a crush?”
Baekhyun pales for a moment before he squeaks out, “You didn’t hear that from me!” and jogs over to where Chanyeol’s sharing his game plan with the rest of the team.
Sehun ponders over this new information for a moment and things finally begin to click. He squints at where Tao’s leaning on the wall still talking with Kim-seonsaengnim.
At that moment, Tao glances up and notices him. She smiles and waves at him excitedly. Sehun observes her cheeks are flushed, probably from the game or maybe from something else. He diverts his attention to Kim-seonsaengnim and he’s surprised that he’s looking at him, too.
---
“So,” Sehun starts just after their PE class is over and they’re walking back to their classroom. “What’s with you and Kim-seonsaengnim?”
“Huh?” Tao asks, visibly confused.
“I saw you two talking in the gym today.” Sehun tries to make his statement sound casual. Like he’s talking about the weather or the traffic.
“Ahhh that,” Tao replies and brisk walks. “We were just talking.”
“It doesn’t seem like just talking,” Sehun mutters and catches up with Tao. “Is he hitting on you or something?”
“WHAT.” Tao stops dead on her tracks. “What the heck are you talking about?” She’s all flustered when she says it, cheeks and tips of her ears flaming red.
“You know that you can count on me if he’s bothering you right?” Sehun continues. “Because that’s called cradle robbing.”
“Oh my god,” Tao bangs her head on the wall. “Are you high or something? He’s not hitting on me and he’s definitely not a cradle robber! He’s only a couple of years older than us, Sehun.”
“Sure,” Sehun says, still suspicious. “But I’ve seen how he treats you.”
Tao’s covering her face with both her hands, completely embarrassed. “And how does he treat me?”
Sehun looks at Tao, at her soft colored hair messed up from the gym and tanned hands on her face. She’s peeking at him from between her fingers and Sehun only notices now at how delicate her fingers look.
“He treats you like a lady,” Sehun murmurs, softly.
Tao lowers down her hands and looks at him. He’s already seen that look a few times now but he still can’t place what it means and it makes him nervous.
“Come on,” Sehun tugs at her hand. “We don’t want to be late for your favorite assistant teacher’s class.”
She doesn’t say anything the rest of the way.
---
Sehun doesn’t know how he got conned into doing the class work but that’s how he finds himself at the end of the day holding a stack of projects on his way to the teacher’s lounge.
He stops at the doorway and debates on whether to put the stack down for a moment to knock or wait for someone but the door opens just as he was leaning down.
“Oh,” Kim-seonsaengnim says, surprised. “Sehun-ah, come in.” He takes half of the folders that Sehun’s carrying and keeps the door open. Sehun’s reminded of a day from a long time ago.
“Where do you want these?”
“It’s for Jung-seonsaengnim’s desk,” Sehun replies. Sehun-ah? When did they get that close?
They set down the paperwork on to the teacher’s desk and Sehun bows a bit. “Thank you Kim-seonsae-“
“Just call me Junmyeon-hyung,” the other interrupts with a charming smile. “I’m not even a teacher yet.” He picks up one of the paperwork and comments, “Your book review was about the The Little Prince? I love that book.”
“Yeah…” Sehun mumbles. He doesn’t really want to be here right now as his eyes dart to the door.
“Zitao told me this is also one of her favorite books,” Junmyeon continues, seemingly unaware of Sehun’s discomfort. “You two are close, right? She told me about her favorite passage.”
This perks up Sehun’s attention as Junmyeon recites Tao’s favorite line:
“Of course I’ll hurt you. Of course you’ll hurt me. Of course we will hurt each other. But this is the very condition of existence. To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.”
He looks at Sehun after he finishes as if waiting for a reaction. When he receives nothing, he asks, “Do you want to know what my favorite line is?”
“What is it?” Sehun replies out of courtesy.
“The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched, they are felt with the heart.”
Junmyeon smiles fondly at Sehun but the expression seems eerie to him. Like there’s a secret on Junmyeon’s lips.
---
It’s late at night when they finish one of their joint projects so Tao decides to sleep over. The futon laid out on the floor is something they’ve both outgrown, old and fraying at the edges.
They decide on who gets to bed by a game of rock, paper, scissor. Tao wins and, to add more salt to Sehun’s injury, jibes that Sehun should have given up his bed in the first place if he was a gentleman.
It’s been several days since Baekhyun slipped up and, for the most part, Sehun has kept that information at the back of his head and only brings it out to think at night.
“Baekhyun told me you like someone,” Sehun blurts out. There’s a momentary pause as he lets the question hang in the air.
“Did he?” Tao replies. “Should have known that I can’t trust that gossipmonger.”
There’s something measured about the way Tao says it, like how she does when she lies to their teachers on why her assignment is late or when she talks to strangers.
“Who is he?” Sehun prods. “Is he giving you a hard time?”
Tao laughs a bit then sighs. Sehun can hear her turn on the bed above him.
“A horrible time.”
He can’t see Tao’s expression right now but he can imagine what it might be. Lips set in a frown, brows knitted together, eyes downcast. Something in Sehun’s gut twists.
“Did you…confess? Did he reject you?” Sehun sits up on the futon and looks at Tao, but she’s facing the wall instead. Under the dim lighting, he can barely see her back stiffen a bit.
“No,” Tao replies. “Not yet.”
“Well… I guess Kim-seonsaengnim’s a pretty decent guy...”
Tao turns over and stares at him, frowning. “What makes you think it’s Junmyeon-oppa?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Sehun gruffs. You’ve been paying oppa a lot of attention lately, his mind nags at him.
“You idiot.” Tao scowls. “It’s because he’s trying to help me get into his university.”
“Oh.” Sehun deflates. “Who is it then? And how come you haven’t told me?”
“It’s because you’re a guy.”
There’s an alarm bell sounding off inside Sehun’s head: this is Tao brushing you off, it says, but he doesn’t listen.
“Baekhyun’s a guy, too, but you told him.”
“That’s different.” Tao exhales. “Baekhyun would understand.”
“And I wouldn’t?” Sehun feels indignant. What’s their eleven years of friendship for? “I can probably help you more than him.”
“Then tell me this, Sehun-ah,” Tao says. “Can men and women really just be friends?”
He remembers this line vaguely off of one of the movies that they used to watch - a classic film called ‘When Harry Met Sally’.
“Yeah…” Sehun trails off. “I mean, there’s you and me.”
“You and me,” Tao repeats miserably. There’s something in the way she twists the blanket around her fingers that makes Sehun reach out and hold her hand.
She continues. “Do you remember that movie Notting Hill? The one with Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts?”
“Of course,” Sehun replies. He doesn’t know where Tao’s trying to go with this.
Tao is silent for a long time, pondering. Sehun can almost see her resolve form as she looks at him - really look as if it’s her first time seeing him. He’s a second too late to realize what this is.
“What if I tell you…” Tao begins, after forever. She takes a deep breath, her eyes misty.
“…that I’m just a girl standing in front of a boy asking him to love her.”
The air around him is suddenly plunged into ice, his hand clammy on top of Tao’s. This is the same hand he’s held through the years, from climbing the monkey bars to making sand castles. The hand that he can’t imagine letting go of.
He can’t hear anything right now. There’s blood thundering in his ears and he can feel every minute movement around him. It feels like an out of body experience.
He takes a deep breath and swallows the lump on his throat before he answers.
“Zitao, I’m sorr-“
Tao jumps out of the bed and snatches her hand off him before he can finish. He makes a move to get up but Tao stops at the doorway, her back to him.
“Don’t.” She says, voice trembling. “Don’t follow me.”
It’s the same voice she used all those years ago when she told Sehun that her pet rabbit died.
Sehun stays rooted to his spot. A few minutes after, he sees the light in her room switch on from across his window before the blinds close down.
---
There was a time when Tao got obsessed with romantic movies ranging from funny romantic-comedies to sappy, dramatic ones. She would hole herself up in her room armed with a bucket of chicken and her laptop and stayed there for hours at a time streaming movies from illegal sites.
She even ignored Sehun in favor of her movie marathons. When Sehun came to visit during a particularly rainy day, he immediately regretted entering her room. There was a bin full of used tissue by the corner and that was enough of a bad sign for Sehun to know that it was time to step out of the room immediately.
But he wasn’t quick enough as Tao grabbed his elbow and dragged him over to her bed.
“JOIN ME,” Tao wailed, hugging his arm.
“What are you watching now?” Sehun grumbled and made himself comfortable on her bed. There was no escaping a sobbing Tao. He just wouldn’t be able to refuse.
“A Walk to Remember,” Tao mumbled against her pillow. “Before that it was The Notebook.”
“Didn’t you watch those two a hundred times already? Can’t we watch something more fun?”
“Shhh,” Tao put a finger against his lips. “This is almost finished. She already passed away.” A sob. “Then we’ll watch a Julia Roberts movie since you like those.”
“I don’t like those movies!” Sehun defended himself. “I just think they’re happier than this mess you’re watching.”
Tao stayed quiet after that and just absorbed the movie before clicking on ‘Notting Hill’ from the selection on the site. It was one of the few movies that Sehun liked because it was mostly told in the man’s point of view. And he agreed to its message, mostly, up until the point Hugh Grant started chasing after Julia Roberts for their second chance at their own happily ever after. Didn’t the guy know the saying ‘fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me’?
Tao interrupted his thoughts when she said, “When I find someone I love, I will combine all the greatest confessions in these movies and say it to him.” She sighed dreamily as the future scenes of the onscreen couple passed by.
“Well aren’t you original,” Sehun drawled.
Tao slitted him a glare. “If it worked for them then why wouldn’t it work for me?”
“Because those lines were made for movies, you idiot.” Sehun explained. “Real life just doesn’t work the same way.”
“Then I’ll make it work,” Tao replied. “I’m Huang Zitao and there’s nothing in this world that’s impossible for me.”
She looked defiant, ready to take on the world. Back then, Sehun hadn’t thought that the same strong girl would show her weakness to him.
---
Tao doesn’t show up the next day to school. And the next and the day after the next.
The first two days Sehun didn’t come over because he was giving her time. By the third day, he decides that’s enough.
He marches over to the Huang’s and rings the doorbell. He knows they keep a secret key under the potted plant that he always uses but after everything that’s happened, he feels like he’s intruding somehow.
“Sehun-ah!” It’s Aunt who greets him by the door. Oddly enough, she doesn’t let him through like she usually does. “Tao’s not really feeling well right now so I think it’s better if you go back so you don’t catch what she has.”
Sehun knows that’s a lie. He can see it in Aunt’s expression and by the way her eyes tell him to just go back home because that’s what Tao asked her to do. He doesn’t, though.
“I really need to talk her. Can I just see her for a while? Please?” Sehun puts on the best kicked puppy expression that he knows she can’t refuse. It’s the one that does all the pleading. He has to see Tao now before it’s too late to see her anymore.
Aunt sighs and opens the door for him. “I don’t know what happened. She wouldn’t tell me. She just told me that she’ll be at home for a while and to not let you in. But if there’s someone who can fix this, I know it’s you.”
She gives him an encouraging smile and Sehun feels like he’s betrayed her. He swallows heavily as he steps inside and the guilt leaves a burning trail down his throat.
Sehun arrives in front of Tao’s room and he knocks twice. There’s no answer so he knocks again before saying, “I’m coming in.”
The room looks the same as Sehun last saw it. There’s the same clutter on the floor that he saw three days ago but to him it feels like it’s been ages since he’s been here.
He spots Tao lying sideways on her bed, sleeping. She looks peaceful - too peaceful - that, for a brief moment, Sehun has the urge to run over and check if she’s still breathing.
He doesn’t do it when he notices the subtle rise and fall of her chest. He doesn’t wake her up either, just sits on the floor beside her bed and watches her - tracing the edges of her face and the curve of her lips with his eyes.
It’s been eleven years, he thinks. They’ve both changed so much in that span of time, physically and emotionally. He hadn’t thought of her as anything but his very best friend, but now her definition has segregated into several parts.
There’s Tao the classmate, Tao the sports buddy, Tao the Jr. chef, and most importantly, there’s Tao, his childhood best friend. The one person who knows him best more than anyone in the world.
The other important Tao is Tao the girl he grew up with that he’s only starting to realize is becoming a woman.
He leans over and brushes the hair off Tao’s face and lets his hand linger on her ear.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Sehun whispers. “Because if I did then I’ll end up losing you.”
Tao stirs and opens her eyes. When she speaks, her voice sounds hoarse seemingly from disuse.
“And you don’t think you’re hurting me now?”
“How long have you been awake?” He puts his hand down on the mattress and avoids the question.
Tao drops her gaze to his hand then stares at Sehun before saying, “Long enough.”
She’s giving him the same imploring look he’s seen on her several times and it’s only now that Sehun comprehends what it means.
“Zitao…” Sehun begins. “What if this doesn’t work out? It’ll hurt even more down the road and we’ll end up losing this.” He makes a gesture between the two of them trying to indicate what they have because now Sehun’s not even sure what it is anymore.
“It’s a risk I’d be willing to take,” she says after a while.
Sehun squeezes her hand. “Let’s just stop this,” Sehun pleads. “What we have right now is perfect.”
Tao slips her hand away from him. “Maybe for you,” Tao says, sadly. “Why won’t you take me seriously?”
“I am taking you seriously.”
“Just give this a chance.” There’s urgency in Tao’s voice. “Give me a chance.”
Sehun levels his stare with Tao’s. This is the leap right before the plane crashes with no parachute or landing in sight. This is eleven years of friendship and more right before it sparks off. He can’t move or say anything. Is this how it feels like to be swallowed whole by fear?
It takes forever before any of them says anything and it is Tao that breaks the silence.
“I see,” Tao says quietly. There’s a tear rolling off the side of her right eye and it stains her pillow. Soon, others begin to follow.
Sehun scoops her face between his hands and kisses the tears away, one by one. I’m sorry, he wants to say, but the words are stuck in his throat. He hugs her tight and lets her fall asleep crying.
---
Sehun comes over the next night and, as he lies next to Tao reminiscent of old times, Tao tells him, “You better savor this moment now because this won’t be happening for a while.”
Sehun knows she meant to say it as a joke, but it comes out heavy and sad. She had asked for some space and time apart to settle her feelings and Sehun knows he’d be an asshole if he doesn’t let her.
They lay still for a moment, side by side, before Sehun decides - fuck this. He turns his body, chest resting against Tao’s back, and loops his arms around Tao’s waist.
“Hi,” Sehun mumbles against her hair.
“What are you doing?”
“Savoring this moment just as you said.” He nuzzles his nose against her neck.
“Sehun…” Tao warns him. Don’t be selfish.
He tightens his hold around her. “Go to sleep, little spoon.”
Tao remains quiet for a while. Thirty minutes, or maybe forty, pass by before he feels her settle into rhythmic breathing. In the dim lighting of the room, Sehun’s other senses are heightened.
He realizes how much of a woman Tao is now as their bodies are aligned together - the curve of her back pressed against his chest, down to the sharp dip of her waist. She’s soft and toned at the same time, warm and alive beside him. And just before he yields to sleep, his mind lingers on what Tao said previously:
Just give this a chance, his heart whispers into the night.
I'll risk everything if it's for you
A whisper into the night
Telling me it's not my time, and don't give up
I've never stood up before
This time however I won't let go of this hand
I clutched what I cannot relinquish
- The Beginning, One OK Rock
Prompt Given: girl!Tao/Sehun - (girls!au; highschool!au {pg-13}) girl!Tao unfortunately falls in love with her bestfriend Sehun. The latter just sees her as a friend.
Notes: A huge, huge thank you to pusong_kahon for being my writing commander and for monitoring my progress, to Jam for all the help and handholding she gave me, and to mapofwords for all the brainstorming, concrit and cramming support. Some scenes were inspired by the Korean drama "Reply 1997" so if you haven't watched that then please do so. It's one of my favorites.
Sehun/girl!Tao
9,420 words
They say senior year of high school is the best time to fall in love.
Written for zitaomfg for the Totaolly fic fest. To my dear recipient, I hope you enjoy this!
growing pains
“Have you ever been in love?” Tao asks him one day. It’s raining outside, the cold air seeping through the small crack on the glass window. It’s one of those rare days of the summer when the weather decides to joke around.
Tao has her feet up against the windowsill, staring blankly outside. Sehun wonders, briefly, if he should answer the question seriously or if Tao’s just joking around like she usually does.
He opts for something safe instead.
“What do you mean?” Sehun asks, stealing a glance.
“Like,” Tao turns to look at him, “you know, in the movies.”
“Are you in love?” Sehun throws back the question, voice teasing and lips tugging at the corners.
“Don’t be stupid,” Tao replies hotly. “You’ve known me for forever and you know I’ve never been in - anything.”
“Then there’s your answer. You’ve known me for forever, too, and you know I don’t believe in that.”
Tao shrugs and a small section of her hair falls to her shoulder. If Sehun exerts enough effort he could reach up and tuck the strands back to her bun but the weather is making him lazy. He repositions on the couch instead, head lying on the armrest.
“What’s up with the question anyway?” Sehun yawns.
“Nothing,” Tao frowns and traces the path of the raindrop against the glass window. Sehun knows that look, but he doesn’t say anything. He offers his bag of chips instead, hand extended out just enough for Tao’s reach.
“Want some?”
Tao grins and grabs the whole bag for herself.
---
Sehun was seven when the Huang’s had moved in next door with a lot of fanfare. It was a summer weekend, the sun hot and sweltering, and Sehun peeked through the window as their new neighbors carried boxes inside the house, shirts sticking to their backs.
That was the first time Sehun caught a glimpse of Tao: sitting on the sidewalk, hair cut short above the ears and wearing loose fitting shorts. When the kid glanced up at Sehun, he ducked down the window, blood thundering in his ears.
‘A boy,’ Sehun thought. He swallowed the fear down his throat even though his palms were already getting clammy. ‘He looked like he was gonna punch me.’
He didn’t dare to sneak in another glance.
---
Senior year is the most memorable time for most high school students, or at least that’s what people say. For Sehun, it feels the same as any other school year. He gets up in the morning, dresses in his uniform, and goes next door to eat a traditional Chinese breakfast in Tao’s dining table. He can hear Tao’s mother shouting at Tao that they’re going to be late. Sehun doesn’t care if that means he gets to have Tao’s share of breakfast.
“So?” Tao appears in front of him and twirls. “What do you think?”
Brown, that’s all that Sehun can see as the sunlight filters through the window and reflects on Tao’s head.
“It’s nice,” Sehun says, non-committal.
“Just nice?” Tao sits on the chair beside him and scoots closer while stealing a piece of fried egg off Sehun’s plate. She’s going to regret all that grease on her hand and complain to Sehun later, but for now she’s happily chewing off the sides of the egg white, softly curled hair framing her face.
“Just nice.” Sehun rolls his eyes. “If you were looking for a comprehensive review, you should have asked one of your girlfriends. When did you do that anyway? Yesterday morning you still had your old hair.”
“Last night,” Tao replies. “And this is why I didn’t bring you with me. You have horrible taste!”
“I’m a guy. What do you expect?” He sets his chopsticks down and grabs his bag off the other chair. “Come on, we’re going to be late.”
Tao’s still sitting, the piece of egg yolk back on Sehun’s plate. She’s sulking on her chair and Sehun can already feel the protests ready to spill out of her mouth.
“Fine,” Sehun says, arms raised in surrender. “It’s cute.”
“You’re just saying that to appease me.” She purses her lips and crosses her arms against her chest.
“Partly,” he replies truthfully. “But okay, I admit, it looks good on you.” It does look good, the light bouncing off the newly dyed brown strands more readily than Tao’s previous dark hair. But even so, Sehun’s already missing the deep black.
“Can we just go now, your highness?” Sehun prods Tao’s socked toes with his own. “Your cuteness?”
“You’re so gross!” Tao yelps, but she’s grinning. “Okay my dear knight, fetch me my carriage.”
Sehun shakes his head and makes gagging sounds, but he still does what he’s told.
On the way to school, Sehun releases his hold on one of the bike’s clutch and ruffles Tao’s hair as he passes her. It’s soft and smooth, strands sparkling under the daylight, and she swats his hand away with a laugh.
---
“Yah!” Jongin shouts as he slaps Sehun’s back just when they’re parking their bikes. “What happened? I don’t see you for a month and suddenly you’re a giant.”
Puberty had been gracious to Sehun over the past summer, adding a few more centimeters to his height than what is normally appropriate. His shoulders are broader, too, giving fullness and breadth to his previously lanky frame.
With this newly acquired body comes with a certain awareness in Sehun making him mindful of his longer limbs and height. He maneuvers Jongin’s arm around him, careful not to accidentally elbow Tao or else she’ll give him a good beating.
“Did he?” Tao stands up and gives him a once over. “I never noticed.”
“It’s because you guys see each other every day.” Jongin explains and looks at Tao. “Nice hair.”
“Just nice?” Tao asks, and Jongin opens his mouth to reply, but Tao raises her hand to cut him off. “Nevermind. I already know what you’re going to say.”
She gives a sidelong glance at Sehun, who beams at her and turns to Jongin instead.
“And whose fault is it anyway that we didn’t get to see each other?”
Jongin shrugs, grinning. “Can’t help it. My favorite hyung was back in town during the summer.”
“You mean your hopelessly one-sided puppy crush,” Tao says as they start walking to their class.
“IT’S NOT A PUPPY CRUSH,” Jongin shouts. “AND IT’S NOT ONE-SIDED.”
“Sure,” Sehun replies. “Except your sentences just negated each other.”
“Stop.” Jongin pauses mid-step and starts massaging his temple. “It’s too early for you to tag team against me. I can’t win over your ten? eleven? years of telepathic friendship. Where are the others anyway?”
“Eleven,” Tao corrects him. “And Chanyeol and Baekhyun are probably late as usual.”
She scans the hallway and eyes a group of girls by the window who Sehun noticed had been looking at them since they got there.
“Let’s just go,” she says, looping her arms along Jongin’s and Sehun’s and proceeds to drag them to their classroom. “I don’t wanna be late like those two.”
---
The first time Sehun and Tao actually met was when Mr. and Mrs. Oh dragged their children over to the Huang’s. It was an early Sunday morning, when people were out sweeping the streets outside their houses and sprinkling water on their plants. The Huang’s were one of those people and the Oh seniors, being naturally curious people, went over to greet them, which inevitably led to introducing their children to each other.
Huang Zitao was the name of the Huang’s only child, and as Mrs. Huang went inside the house to pick up her child, Sehun felt his gut churning at the thought of being punched on their first meeting. He didn’t even know why, but that was the general vibe he got from the other. Tall, sharp eyes, dark hair.
When Zitao stepped out of the house, he let out a gasp. The kid was wearing a dress, boy cut hair pinned on one side with a flower clip.
“A girl,” Sehun muttered mostly to himself. Zitao only glared at him harder.
Back then, Sehun never thought he’d end up being close to the kid he mistook as a boy only to get smacked right over the head, and that this occurrence would continue on for years.
---
“Stop daydreaming.” Tao gives a soft kick to Sehun’s leg. “There won’t be any food left if we don’t get there on time.”
“The guys will save us some.” Sehun stands up and stretches his arms above his head feeling his spine clicking in place. First day of classes is usually the most boring.
“Jongin’s right,” Tao mutters, staring at him.
“Hmm?” Sehun turns to look at her.
“You really did grow a bit,” Tao replies and measures herself against Sehun, side by side.
“I’m a growing boy,” Sehun grins, bumping his shoulder against Tao’s. “And you just stopped growing.”
“Yah,” Tao retorts. “Don’t be cocky now. I said just a bit. Besides, it wouldn’t look good for a girl to be taller than most guys anyway.”
“You used to love being taller than me,” Sehun scoffs. “You said the angle was good so you can hit my head easier.”
“Don’t remind me,” Tao shushes him. “Real ladies don’t act that way.”
“I don’t see one here,” Sehun mumbles and smirks.
Tao raises her arm and swipes at Sehun.
“What was it that you said again?” Sehun catches her hand and mimics Tao’s voice. “Real ladies don’t act that way.”
“Aish,” Tao hisses and tries to shrug off his grasp, but Sehun squeezes her hand, face breaking out into a full smile.
“And here I thought you were rushing to get to lunch,” he says as he tugs Tao out the door.
“Then, my dear knight, lead the way.”
---
The first time Tao blessed (or cursed) him with the knight nickname was after they had just finished watching a gazillion Disney princess movies. Sehun was forced to sit through it with the combined forces of his noona and Tao. After the fifth movie, Tao had declared him to be her knight in shining armor since she was saving up the prince position for her future husband.
She sighed dreamily along with Sehun’s noona, Jihye, while they picked the next torture to put Sehun through. If Tao and Sehun were like peas in a pod then Tao and Jihye were like idol and fan since Jihye was the only other female figure in Tao’s life close to their age. Tao followed whatever Jihye did, which included an unfortunate amount of romanticism in the form of romance novels, movies and stories.
When Sehun’s noona experienced her first heartbreak, Sehun and Tao were both there to witness it. Tao cried with Jihye and consoled her while Sehun grunted in response, too young and awkward to give any real comfort to what he called “girl feelings”.
That was just the first of many. By Jihye’s fourth failed relationship, Sehun vowed to never fall in love. What good was it when all it did was to hurt people in the end? Every time he thought about love, he could imagine his noona’s crying face with Tao beside her, tears in their eyes.
Love, he thought, only ended in happily ever after in movies and maybe for one person in every one thousand. Real life proved to be otherwise, and Sehun didn’t want to end up being the bad guy that would hurt the female lead before the ending credits.
Jihye’s venture into finding her One True Love had the opposite effect on Tao, however. For every downfall, it just spurred Tao even more to be a hopeless romantic.
“Don’t give up on love, Tao.” Sehun had overheard his noona tell her before when they were sitting outside on the porch. “Once you find it, don’t let it go because it will be worth it. As a great philosopher once said, ‘You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.’”
“I won’t,” Tao had whispered, almost in reverence. Sehun could almost imagine the stars in her eyes. “And which philosopher said that?”
“Dr. Seuss,” Jihye had replied with a laugh.
A month after, Jihye moved to an apartment near her university after a bad breakup from someone in their neighborhood and all Sehun could think of was a passage from a comic book he was reading:
Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.
Love was, for Sehun, a horrible thing.
It still is.
---
Over the course of the next few weeks after the start of their senior year, Sehun has received several love letters and confessions. The first one took him by surprise, the second one even more surprising, but by the tenth one the charm has worn off.
“I’m sorry,” Sehun begins this familiar line, “but I don’t feel the same way about you and I don’t have any plans of dating anyone either.”
Better to receive the heartbreak now than later, he reasons out.
“I see…” the girl says. She said her name is Erin, a previous classmate from their younger years.
“And this has nothing to do with Tao?” She adds.
“Tao?” Sehun asks, confused. “Huang Zitao?”
“Yeah…” Erin murmurs. “I’m not getting rejected because you’re interested in her or anything right? Since you two are always together…”
“No!” Sehun quickly denies it. “I mean, of course not. Tao and I are just best friends.”
Speaking of Tao, Sehun is reminded of how they were supposed to meet up after class today. That was ten minutes ago. He inwardly groans and clenches his eyes together and when he opens them he catches a glimpse of brown hair turn a corner.
“Thank you for liking me,” Sehun says formally. “But I’m sorry that I can’t return your affections.” He bows a bit at her and quickens his pace as he turns a corner.
“How long have you been here?”
Tao’s leaning on the wall, her bag on one shoulder and Sehun’s bag by her feet. There’s something with the way Tao looks at him that makes him feel uneasy. Her eyes look slightly glassy, but it might just be by the way the sunlight by the window across the hallway hits her eyes.
Tao smiles at him, slowly, and says, “Long enough.”
---
“Are you going to eat that?”
Yes, Sehun wants to say, but Tao’s already reaching over to grab the remaining noodles of his jjajangmyeon. She twists it on her chopsticks and looks at him seemingly waiting for his approval.
“Go ahead,” Sehun replies and shakes his head. “I don’t even know why you love umma’s jjajangmyeon so much when aunt makes the more authentic one.”
Tao slurps on the noodles loudly and it makes Sehun smile. This feels more like the Tao he knows compared to that strange moment they had earlier and the silent walk back home.
“I like the Korean style better. It’s sweeter? Maybe I’ve finally acquired that Korean taste, heh.”
Sehun remembers how picky Tao was when she just arrived from China. It had been the cause of their biggest (and pettiest) arguments when Sehun wanted to eat Korean food and Tao would pick to go to a Chinese place instead. Just one of the things that made him wonder how they were even friends in the first place.
“So,” Tao begins. “What’s up with you and Erin?”
“Who?”
“The girl who confessed to you earlier!” Tao makes a swipe at his forehead with her chopsticks but Sehun deftly dodges it.
“What’s there to ask about?” Sehun leans back on his chair and stretches his legs under the table. “It’s not like you didn’t hear it.”
“Who knows, maybe you rejected her but then you’re thinking the opposite.” There are still some noodles left on Tao’s bowl that she’s swirling them around aimlessly.
“Unlike you girls, us guys actually mean ‘no’ when we say it.”
The side of Tao’s mouth is stained with jjajangmyeon and Sehun reaches over to wipe it off with his thumb.
“Don’t be sexist now.” Tao chides but the ends of her lips are tugging.
“I’m just saying.” Sehun rolls his eyes. “Besides, I’ve already got you. Getting a girlfriend is like asking for twice the headache.”
Tao shoves him over. “Shut up,” she says but she’s smiling. All teeth and crinkly eyes. Young and alive.
Sehun shoves her back. “And what’s with that creepy smile?”
“I already said shut up, Sehun.”
She doesn’t say anything more after that. Just returns to Sehun’s bowl of jjajangmyeon and finishes it off with a smile.
---
If Sehun’s going to be honest with himself, Tao has been this huge constant headache for him. It’s just through years of conditioning (and suffering) that Sehun has finally perfected the Art of Eternal Patience.
The multiple events that transpired over their years of friendship (and probably non-friendship) have somehow made Sehun fit in with Tao’s personality and Tao to him like two pieces of a whole. If he is to think of one major event though, it might have been the day of his circumsion:
“You’re a man now!” Tao exclaimed, giggling. She had just burst inside his room and invaded the last remnant of his privacy.
Sehun groaned. In his head, this was worst case scenario #1.
“How did you even find out? I made umma and noona promise not to tell. Especially you.”
“I’m hurt,” Tao clutched at her chest but she was grinning. “Besides, it’s easy. It’s summer and boys our age never get sick unless it’s that.”
Tao sat down on the bed and Sehun winced at the impact. “So how does it feel?”
“Shut up.” Sehun growled.
“Do you feel more like a man now?” Tao continued.
“I feel like sleeping. Quietly. Alone. In Peace.”
“Come on,” Tao urged. “This is an important rite of passage for you. I mean, after this you’re supposed to be ready to fall in love now.”
“And who’s feeding you all that crap?” Sehun looked at her oddly.
“Jihye-unnie.”
Sehun sighed. “Just go away. Do your girly things.”
“No way.” Tao grinned devilishly and started climbing up the bed. “I wanna see it.”
“What the ---” Sehun stopped when he felt her fumbling at the bedsheets and -
“Yah!! Watch where you’re touc--- HUANG ZITAO!!!!”
And that was worst case scenario #2. Personal space seemed non-existent after that.
---
“So? What was that about?” They’re walking down the aisle of fresh produce and doing their families’ grocery shopping when Sehun asks the question.
He’s referring to the scene he chanced upon when he was looking for Tao earlier after their classes ended. She was with three other girls from another class and they seemed to have been engaged in an intense talk. Tao had her scary expression on, the one that she only uses when she’s in trouble. But the situation had diffused when they saw Sehun approach them and the girls had quickly gone away after greeting Sehun their goodbye’s.
“Nothing,” Tao replies. She turns around from where she’s examining a basket of strawberries and brushes imaginary lint off Sehun’s shoulder. “There’s just been too many pesky flies flying around you lately.”
“Zitao…” Sehun gives him the look.
“What?” Tao huffs. She tightens her hold on the Huang’s grocery list while Sehun has his own. Their families like to pair them together using the logic that they can at least maximize the “buy one, take one” offers in the grocery and just share it between them.
“They were the ones who asked me to go with them,” Tao says as if that explains everything.
Sehun shakes his head. “Don’t get into trouble on our last year in high school. I don’t want to hear it from Aunt and Uncle and my parents.”
“Are you siding with them?” Tao asks admonishingly. “And I’ve never gotten us into trouble!”
Sure, Sehun wants to say, but he’s pretty sure that his face is telling that to Tao right now.
“Okay, so maybe there was that incident back in sixth grade…” Tao concedes.
It’s not just that incident back in sixth grade. Through their history of friendship, Tao has gotten into several fights, both silly and righteous. It’s actually through a fight that their friendship was made.
It was during the first three months when the Huangs first moved in that Sehun got into trouble with the neighborhood bullies. It was raining hard that day and one of them had pushed Sehun down on the mud when Tao happened to pass by. She was wearing a dress and holding an umbrella and a bag of oranges.
The next moment went like a blur, but the next time Sehun came around, the other boys were either fleeing the scene or down on the mud with him. Tao stood in front of him, white dress wet and splattered with mud stains, broken umbrella and scattered oranges lying on the ground.
“Are you okay?” Tao asked in stilted Korean. Sehun was surprised to find her voice soft and high pitched. Not at all like a boy’s.
Sehun can’t remember what he said back then, but he remembers taking Tao’s offered hand and walking home together.
Eleven years down the road, he’s still holding on.
---
Monday to Thursday lunch is usually spent inside the cafeteria, but Friday lunch is something of a tradition to their group where they spend it out on a certain grassy spot under the tree of their school. It’s right after their gym class, too, so it feels nice to just lie on the ground and stretch after straining their bodies over menial, physical tasks.
It’s usually around this time that they also start talking about fifty different topics at the same time. Last week had been about university entrance exams and street food and what’s the weirdest thing they’ve ever eaten (“snake,” Tao had replied), but today’s topic is about love.
Unfortunately, for Sehun, he’s stuck with the constant nagging of the combined forces of Jongin, Chanyeol and Baekhyun asking him about his ideal type.
“I don’t have any because I don’t plan on falling in love in the first place,” Sehun says.
“It’s because you’re not supposed to plan it, dummy.” Tao retorts. “It’s just going to happen.”
“Says the hopeless romantic.” Sehun side-eyes her.
Tao opens her mouth for a comeback but Jongdae interrupts them. “But if you were, hypothetically speaking, to fall in love, what would she be like?”
Sehun puts his sandwich down and thinks over the question. He hasn’t really consciously thought about this before. Maybe just once or twice, but mostly in passing whenever he watched romantic movies with Tao or Jihye-noona.
“On a purely physical level, someone attractive, I guess.” Sehun answers.
Jongin snorts. “Isn’t that what everybody wants? Give us something more specific.”
He takes another moment to think it over and feels eyes settling on him. When he glances at its direction, it’s Tao and she’s listening attentively.
“I guess,” Sehun begins, pondering. “I’d like someone who can make me laugh and understands me.”
“You mean like Tao,” Chanyeol grins. “Except not Tao.”
Baekhyun smacks him over the head. “Shut up.”
“What?” Chanyeol asks. “But it’s true.”
“Right,” Tao says. She gazes at Sehun, smiling softly. “Of course.”
It’s the first time Sehun’s seen that expression on her. It reminds him of that time he caught her listening on his rejection of the girl from before, but this one feels more intense by tenfold but also muted at the same time. He doesn’t know where to begin to understand it.
---
It’s been a long and tiring day for Sehun and all he wants to do is curl up like a cat in his bed and sleep for a gazillion years. That doesn’t happen, of course, because Tao drags him off to the park near their houses to study “in this amazingly perfect weather.”
The first thing he does when he gets there is plop on the chair and rest his head on the table. At least Tao’s right about the weather - it is the perfect time to go outside and sleep.
He can hear her arranging her study materials right beside where his head is resting and the background noise lulls him further to sleep. Twenty, maybe thirty minutes pass with his eyes closed, the sunlight touching his eyelids.
“Sehun?” Tao asks very softly. It’s almost a whisper. “Sehun-ah?”
He doesn’t respond. Everything feels heavy and lazy right now. He’s in between that plane of wakefulness and dreaming, and he knows if he opens his mouth now he’s going to lose that.
Instead, he feels fingers thread through his hair. They’re soft fingers, the touches gentle, almost gingerly. He knows they’re Tao’s because who else could it be? He just doesn’t know why. Maybe it’s one of Tao’s impulsive, spur of the moment actions that she’s seen on TV. He feels the fingers trail down to his nape, feathering the baby hairs growing there. And then he hears someone inhale-
“Are you sniffing me?”
Sehun feels Tao stop her ministrations.
“I’m not!”
He turns his head around so that he’s facing Tao. She’s back to her books, but Sehun knows she’s not reading because her eyes never leave the same spot.
He grins lazily, teasingly. “What are you, a dog?”
“Do I look like a dog?” Tao counters. Sehun suddenly finds himself with the imaginary image of Tao with cute fluffy ears and a hyperactive wagging tail and he bursts out laughing. When he comes down from it and opens his eyes, Tao’s frowning at him and looking hurt.
“Sometimes I don’t even know if you know I’m a girl,” Tao says as she starts packing up her things.
“Of course I know,” Sehun scoffs, indignant.
“You know,” Tao says quietly, “but do you see me as one?”
Sehun doesn’t know why but he feels irritated with the question. It’s almost like Tao’s accusing him of being a bad friend.
“Why are you even asking me this?”
“Nevermind,” Tao replies, shaking her head. “Forget I asked.” By the time she’s finished saying that, she’s already packed and heading back home. Sehun’s left sitting at the park, head still resting on the table as he watches Tao’s back shrink further away from him.
---
Cooking class is probably one of the worst classes that Sehun has to deal with. Today’s task is baking a cake and his randomly selected group has decided on a chocolate cake, which is becoming more and more visually unappetizing. He tries to salvage it by covering it with cream, which doesn’t seem to be working since his big hands don’t have the finesse needed to apply it as sparingly and stylistically as possible.
Sehun searches for the other girls in his team only to find them flirting it up with the new teacher’s assistant that was recently assigned to their school. Him and Jongin have an ongoing bet that Kim-seonsaengnim is actually a chaebol going by his looks and mannerisms. Even his name sounds rich: Kim Junmyeon.
The teacher’s assistant said that they could just call him Junmyeon-hyung since he’s only a couple of years older, but Sehun refuses to. He’s going by his own principle that a man with that face and social skills cannot be trusted. He squints at the girl beside Kim-seonsaengnim who confessed to him just over a week ago but is now all over the new assistant.
Girls, Sehun sighs, and stops trying to put even more cream to their monster cake. He inspects it again and arrives to a conclusion: it’s a disaster.
“Sehun-ah,” Sehun hears Tao call out his name. She’s coming over to his table and holding a beautiful strawberry adorned chocolate cake with a few pieces cut out already.
Sehun groans. “Why couldn’t I have been in your team?” Tao’s always been gifted when it comes to baking.
She grins and cuts out a small piece for Sehun. “This is for you.”
Sehun quickly takes a bite out of it and moans loudly. “I’ve died and have gone to heaven.”
Tao nudges him with her elbow and says, “You’re overreacting,” but she’s glowing, smile spread out from one end of her face to another.
“I’m not,” Sehun says, just as Kim-seonsaengnim says the same thing. “He’s not.”
Tao whirls around and Kim-seonsaengnim is behind her, holding on to a bigger piece of cake that Tao’s group had submitted for grading.
“It’s really good. The layers of cake are very soft and moist, and the filling and icing have this subtly bittersweet taste that goes well with the tangy sweetness of the strawberries. The visual aspect was also not disregarded. Great job, Zitao.”
“Uhh,” Tao mumbles, “thank you.”
Sehun squints at Tao. Is that a flush creeping up her cheeks? He continues to observe their exchange as Tao bows a bit at Kim-seonsaengnim as a way of saying thanks just as the teacher’s assistant goes to another table to talk with the students.
“What?” Tao asks when she noticed Sehun looking at her.
Sehun shrugs and grabs her hand instead and asks for her help to save his team’s cake.
“That’s cheating,” Tao says, but she’s already chopping up various pieces of fruits to decorate the cake with.
---
Tao seems to quickly warm up to Kim-seonsaengnim after their initial interaction. Sehun notices how she studies extra hard for the subjects he’s assisting on and volunteers to do extra tasks that sometimes makes her come home later and disrupts their tradition of walking home together.
Today is one of those days as Tao exits their classroom holding on to a stack of notebooks that they passed in class.
“You guys go ahead,” Tao says as she adjusts the paper on her arms. “I still need to drop these off.”
Sehun wants to ask if she needs any help but Baekhyun beats him to it. “Do you need help with that?”
“Nah, I can handle this.” Tao grins and glances at Baekhyun’s arm. “You probably can’t carry this weight anyway.”
“Yah!” Baekhyun protests but Tao’s already maneuvered her way into the crowd.
Their group starts walking to the exit just as Sehun catches a flurry of movement in his periphery. He turns and sees Kim-seonsaengnim helping Tao pick up the notebooks that fell to the floor.
Sehun picks up Tao’s voice over the background noise of the other students milling about as she says, “thank you.” He wants to go and help, but he stops as Kim-seonsaengnim tells Tao that he’s going back to the faculty lounge so it’s best that they share the stack.
He watches as they chat down the hall on their way to the office with Kim-seonsaengnim carrying more than half of the notebooks.
---
Exam season is almost here again so that means logging in longer hours in the library during the days that they don’t have classes. Their parents have kicked them out because they reason out that Sehun and Tao would be too tempted to sleep in or too distracted by other things that doesn’t involve studying if they stayed inside the house. So the library is the answer to their parents’ dilemma.
They’ve been here for almost two hours now with about a billion books just between the two of them. They have been quiet for the most part, but Sehun’s already reaching that breaking point of his sanity where he has to talk to someone or else he might just throw something.
He looks up and stops. The library has high windows made up of multicolored stained glass. It’s the peak of the day just when the sun is directly up in the sky and it goes through the windows creating a myriad of colored lights right where Tao is. She glows with it.
Her hair is disheveled and it forms an almost halo around her. It looks even lighter now than before and Sehun can see the growing dark roots. There’s a growing itch on his palms that’s urging him to pet Tao’s head, smooth down her hair and maybe even comb his fingers through it, but he clamps it down.
Tao seems to notice him staring because she tilts her head at him in a questioning gaze.
“What are you reading?” Sehun tries to calm his nerves.
Tao grins and shows him the cover of her book. It’s a romance novel, which makes Sehun groan in disappointment
“I thought we’re supposed to be here to study?”
Tao rests her chin on her hands and smiles. “I thought that instead of staying here and making myself go insane, I’d rather just read a book I like. Don’t tell me you weren’t going mad yourself.”
“I was,” Sehun admits and tsks. “You know me too well.”
“That’s an understatement,” Tao says and angles her head to the right. Some strands of her hair falls over her face and the way she’s grinning at him makes Sehun think of how this expression fits her so well.
He feels the itch come back tenfold. He wants to lean over and touch her, and he wonders if Tao can read his thoughts at this moment.
---
“What happened?” Tao laughs beside him. They’re by the outdoor faucet near the gym and Sehun’s bent over trying to wash the ketchup stain off his school uniform.
“Nothing,” Sehun grumbles. It’s something that he’d rather forget immediately. “Just bumped into some idiots in the cafeteria.”
“Here, let me,” Tao says as she takes over the cleaning.
Sehun watches her from the side as she adds more soap to his shirt and puts it under the running water, foam building up. The truth is he overheard some guys from another class talking about Tao earlier when she stepped out of the gym.
They were making suggestive and lewd remarks while eating their sandwiches and Sehun couldn’t help bumping a little too hard on them, spilling their drinks and food down their uniforms and into the floor.
He didn’t even bother saying sorry. He just marched straight down to their meeting place and that was only when he noticed that some of the ketchup got to him, too.
“Aigoo,” Tao says, distracting him from his thoughts. “Are you a baby? Making such a mess out of your uniform.”
She holds up his clean but wet shirt and smiles at Sehun. “There you go. Just pop it under the hand dryer in the restroom before you put it on.”
“Thanks.” Sehun smiles back. “And you need to do something about that uniform.”
“What’s wrong with our gym uniform?” Tao twirls around. Her shorts are hiked up higher than usual and her gym shirt is twisted to a knot to fit her upper body closely.
“That’s not how you wear that thing,” Sehun replies grumpily. He unties the knot on her shirt and pulls down her shorts for a bit then examines his work.
“Much better.”
There’s a blush creeping up on Tao’s cheeks and she punches him lightly on the shoulder. “Such a grandpa.”
---
The next time they have their gym class, it’s divided between the boys and the girls with the girls playing volleyball and the boys shooting hoops.
Tao’s off to the side with a group of girls plotting out their game. She’s wearing her gym uniform the same way again and so do the other girls. Sehun feels a stab of annoyance and dribbles the ball a bit harder than he should and it bounces off his grasp. Jongin, who’s playing for the other team, catches it and laughs as he runs towards the goal.
“Yo man, focus!” Chanyeol nudges him at the side as he passes by. Baekhyun gives him a pat on the back, which Sehun thinks might be a bit more sympathetic.
The game continues with Sehun being distracted and Jongin laughing his ass off because of him. He doesn’t even know what’s bothering him, but it stays right there at the back of his head.
They get a five-minute break just as the girl’s volleyball game does and he walks over to Tao’s side to let off some steam. He stops when he sees Tao jog over to Kim-seonsaengnim and starts talking to him animatedly.
Sehun turns on his heel instead and bumps into someone.
“What’s with the long face?” Baekhyun asks, rubbing his nose that collided with Sehun’s shoulder.
“Nothing,” Sehun replies gruffly.
“Doesn’t look like nothing to me,” Baekhyun says. He peers over Sehun to the girls’ side. “Did you get into a fight with Tao?”
“No.” Sehun frowns. “What makes you think that?”
“I don’t know,” Baekhyun and makes flapping motions with his hands. “You’ve been acting weird lately.”
“ME?” Sehun gapes at him. “It’s more like Tao’s the one being odd lately. I mean, look at her. What’s with the get-up?”
“What’s wrong with what she’s wearing? That’s our uniform.” Baekhyun glances at Tao for a while and tilts his head. “I think she’s becoming more cute lately.”
Sehun balks at the comment.
“Okay,” Baekhyun grins. “So maybe she’s acting more girly nowadays. But I think it’s perfectly normal for a teenage girl to be that way.”
Sehun shrugs casually. “I don’t know. She just feels…different.”
“Teenage girls tend to be like that when they have a crush,” Baekhyun comments noncommittally.
Sehun stops and whirls around to face Baekhyun. “Zitao has a crush?”
Baekhyun pales for a moment before he squeaks out, “You didn’t hear that from me!” and jogs over to where Chanyeol’s sharing his game plan with the rest of the team.
Sehun ponders over this new information for a moment and things finally begin to click. He squints at where Tao’s leaning on the wall still talking with Kim-seonsaengnim.
At that moment, Tao glances up and notices him. She smiles and waves at him excitedly. Sehun observes her cheeks are flushed, probably from the game or maybe from something else. He diverts his attention to Kim-seonsaengnim and he’s surprised that he’s looking at him, too.
---
“So,” Sehun starts just after their PE class is over and they’re walking back to their classroom. “What’s with you and Kim-seonsaengnim?”
“Huh?” Tao asks, visibly confused.
“I saw you two talking in the gym today.” Sehun tries to make his statement sound casual. Like he’s talking about the weather or the traffic.
“Ahhh that,” Tao replies and brisk walks. “We were just talking.”
“It doesn’t seem like just talking,” Sehun mutters and catches up with Tao. “Is he hitting on you or something?”
“WHAT.” Tao stops dead on her tracks. “What the heck are you talking about?” She’s all flustered when she says it, cheeks and tips of her ears flaming red.
“You know that you can count on me if he’s bothering you right?” Sehun continues. “Because that’s called cradle robbing.”
“Oh my god,” Tao bangs her head on the wall. “Are you high or something? He’s not hitting on me and he’s definitely not a cradle robber! He’s only a couple of years older than us, Sehun.”
“Sure,” Sehun says, still suspicious. “But I’ve seen how he treats you.”
Tao’s covering her face with both her hands, completely embarrassed. “And how does he treat me?”
Sehun looks at Tao, at her soft colored hair messed up from the gym and tanned hands on her face. She’s peeking at him from between her fingers and Sehun only notices now at how delicate her fingers look.
“He treats you like a lady,” Sehun murmurs, softly.
Tao lowers down her hands and looks at him. He’s already seen that look a few times now but he still can’t place what it means and it makes him nervous.
“Come on,” Sehun tugs at her hand. “We don’t want to be late for your favorite assistant teacher’s class.”
She doesn’t say anything the rest of the way.
---
Sehun doesn’t know how he got conned into doing the class work but that’s how he finds himself at the end of the day holding a stack of projects on his way to the teacher’s lounge.
He stops at the doorway and debates on whether to put the stack down for a moment to knock or wait for someone but the door opens just as he was leaning down.
“Oh,” Kim-seonsaengnim says, surprised. “Sehun-ah, come in.” He takes half of the folders that Sehun’s carrying and keeps the door open. Sehun’s reminded of a day from a long time ago.
“Where do you want these?”
“It’s for Jung-seonsaengnim’s desk,” Sehun replies. Sehun-ah? When did they get that close?
They set down the paperwork on to the teacher’s desk and Sehun bows a bit. “Thank you Kim-seonsae-“
“Just call me Junmyeon-hyung,” the other interrupts with a charming smile. “I’m not even a teacher yet.” He picks up one of the paperwork and comments, “Your book review was about the The Little Prince? I love that book.”
“Yeah…” Sehun mumbles. He doesn’t really want to be here right now as his eyes dart to the door.
“Zitao told me this is also one of her favorite books,” Junmyeon continues, seemingly unaware of Sehun’s discomfort. “You two are close, right? She told me about her favorite passage.”
This perks up Sehun’s attention as Junmyeon recites Tao’s favorite line:
“Of course I’ll hurt you. Of course you’ll hurt me. Of course we will hurt each other. But this is the very condition of existence. To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.”
He looks at Sehun after he finishes as if waiting for a reaction. When he receives nothing, he asks, “Do you want to know what my favorite line is?”
“What is it?” Sehun replies out of courtesy.
“The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched, they are felt with the heart.”
Junmyeon smiles fondly at Sehun but the expression seems eerie to him. Like there’s a secret on Junmyeon’s lips.
---
It’s late at night when they finish one of their joint projects so Tao decides to sleep over. The futon laid out on the floor is something they’ve both outgrown, old and fraying at the edges.
They decide on who gets to bed by a game of rock, paper, scissor. Tao wins and, to add more salt to Sehun’s injury, jibes that Sehun should have given up his bed in the first place if he was a gentleman.
It’s been several days since Baekhyun slipped up and, for the most part, Sehun has kept that information at the back of his head and only brings it out to think at night.
“Baekhyun told me you like someone,” Sehun blurts out. There’s a momentary pause as he lets the question hang in the air.
“Did he?” Tao replies. “Should have known that I can’t trust that gossipmonger.”
There’s something measured about the way Tao says it, like how she does when she lies to their teachers on why her assignment is late or when she talks to strangers.
“Who is he?” Sehun prods. “Is he giving you a hard time?”
Tao laughs a bit then sighs. Sehun can hear her turn on the bed above him.
“A horrible time.”
He can’t see Tao’s expression right now but he can imagine what it might be. Lips set in a frown, brows knitted together, eyes downcast. Something in Sehun’s gut twists.
“Did you…confess? Did he reject you?” Sehun sits up on the futon and looks at Tao, but she’s facing the wall instead. Under the dim lighting, he can barely see her back stiffen a bit.
“No,” Tao replies. “Not yet.”
“Well… I guess Kim-seonsaengnim’s a pretty decent guy...”
Tao turns over and stares at him, frowning. “What makes you think it’s Junmyeon-oppa?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Sehun gruffs. You’ve been paying oppa a lot of attention lately, his mind nags at him.
“You idiot.” Tao scowls. “It’s because he’s trying to help me get into his university.”
“Oh.” Sehun deflates. “Who is it then? And how come you haven’t told me?”
“It’s because you’re a guy.”
There’s an alarm bell sounding off inside Sehun’s head: this is Tao brushing you off, it says, but he doesn’t listen.
“Baekhyun’s a guy, too, but you told him.”
“That’s different.” Tao exhales. “Baekhyun would understand.”
“And I wouldn’t?” Sehun feels indignant. What’s their eleven years of friendship for? “I can probably help you more than him.”
“Then tell me this, Sehun-ah,” Tao says. “Can men and women really just be friends?”
He remembers this line vaguely off of one of the movies that they used to watch - a classic film called ‘When Harry Met Sally’.
“Yeah…” Sehun trails off. “I mean, there’s you and me.”
“You and me,” Tao repeats miserably. There’s something in the way she twists the blanket around her fingers that makes Sehun reach out and hold her hand.
She continues. “Do you remember that movie Notting Hill? The one with Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts?”
“Of course,” Sehun replies. He doesn’t know where Tao’s trying to go with this.
Tao is silent for a long time, pondering. Sehun can almost see her resolve form as she looks at him - really look as if it’s her first time seeing him. He’s a second too late to realize what this is.
“What if I tell you…” Tao begins, after forever. She takes a deep breath, her eyes misty.
“…that I’m just a girl standing in front of a boy asking him to love her.”
The air around him is suddenly plunged into ice, his hand clammy on top of Tao’s. This is the same hand he’s held through the years, from climbing the monkey bars to making sand castles. The hand that he can’t imagine letting go of.
He can’t hear anything right now. There’s blood thundering in his ears and he can feel every minute movement around him. It feels like an out of body experience.
He takes a deep breath and swallows the lump on his throat before he answers.
“Zitao, I’m sorr-“
Tao jumps out of the bed and snatches her hand off him before he can finish. He makes a move to get up but Tao stops at the doorway, her back to him.
“Don’t.” She says, voice trembling. “Don’t follow me.”
It’s the same voice she used all those years ago when she told Sehun that her pet rabbit died.
Sehun stays rooted to his spot. A few minutes after, he sees the light in her room switch on from across his window before the blinds close down.
---
There was a time when Tao got obsessed with romantic movies ranging from funny romantic-comedies to sappy, dramatic ones. She would hole herself up in her room armed with a bucket of chicken and her laptop and stayed there for hours at a time streaming movies from illegal sites.
She even ignored Sehun in favor of her movie marathons. When Sehun came to visit during a particularly rainy day, he immediately regretted entering her room. There was a bin full of used tissue by the corner and that was enough of a bad sign for Sehun to know that it was time to step out of the room immediately.
But he wasn’t quick enough as Tao grabbed his elbow and dragged him over to her bed.
“JOIN ME,” Tao wailed, hugging his arm.
“What are you watching now?” Sehun grumbled and made himself comfortable on her bed. There was no escaping a sobbing Tao. He just wouldn’t be able to refuse.
“A Walk to Remember,” Tao mumbled against her pillow. “Before that it was The Notebook.”
“Didn’t you watch those two a hundred times already? Can’t we watch something more fun?”
“Shhh,” Tao put a finger against his lips. “This is almost finished. She already passed away.” A sob. “Then we’ll watch a Julia Roberts movie since you like those.”
“I don’t like those movies!” Sehun defended himself. “I just think they’re happier than this mess you’re watching.”
Tao stayed quiet after that and just absorbed the movie before clicking on ‘Notting Hill’ from the selection on the site. It was one of the few movies that Sehun liked because it was mostly told in the man’s point of view. And he agreed to its message, mostly, up until the point Hugh Grant started chasing after Julia Roberts for their second chance at their own happily ever after. Didn’t the guy know the saying ‘fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me’?
Tao interrupted his thoughts when she said, “When I find someone I love, I will combine all the greatest confessions in these movies and say it to him.” She sighed dreamily as the future scenes of the onscreen couple passed by.
“Well aren’t you original,” Sehun drawled.
Tao slitted him a glare. “If it worked for them then why wouldn’t it work for me?”
“Because those lines were made for movies, you idiot.” Sehun explained. “Real life just doesn’t work the same way.”
“Then I’ll make it work,” Tao replied. “I’m Huang Zitao and there’s nothing in this world that’s impossible for me.”
She looked defiant, ready to take on the world. Back then, Sehun hadn’t thought that the same strong girl would show her weakness to him.
---
Tao doesn’t show up the next day to school. And the next and the day after the next.
The first two days Sehun didn’t come over because he was giving her time. By the third day, he decides that’s enough.
He marches over to the Huang’s and rings the doorbell. He knows they keep a secret key under the potted plant that he always uses but after everything that’s happened, he feels like he’s intruding somehow.
“Sehun-ah!” It’s Aunt who greets him by the door. Oddly enough, she doesn’t let him through like she usually does. “Tao’s not really feeling well right now so I think it’s better if you go back so you don’t catch what she has.”
Sehun knows that’s a lie. He can see it in Aunt’s expression and by the way her eyes tell him to just go back home because that’s what Tao asked her to do. He doesn’t, though.
“I really need to talk her. Can I just see her for a while? Please?” Sehun puts on the best kicked puppy expression that he knows she can’t refuse. It’s the one that does all the pleading. He has to see Tao now before it’s too late to see her anymore.
Aunt sighs and opens the door for him. “I don’t know what happened. She wouldn’t tell me. She just told me that she’ll be at home for a while and to not let you in. But if there’s someone who can fix this, I know it’s you.”
She gives him an encouraging smile and Sehun feels like he’s betrayed her. He swallows heavily as he steps inside and the guilt leaves a burning trail down his throat.
Sehun arrives in front of Tao’s room and he knocks twice. There’s no answer so he knocks again before saying, “I’m coming in.”
The room looks the same as Sehun last saw it. There’s the same clutter on the floor that he saw three days ago but to him it feels like it’s been ages since he’s been here.
He spots Tao lying sideways on her bed, sleeping. She looks peaceful - too peaceful - that, for a brief moment, Sehun has the urge to run over and check if she’s still breathing.
He doesn’t do it when he notices the subtle rise and fall of her chest. He doesn’t wake her up either, just sits on the floor beside her bed and watches her - tracing the edges of her face and the curve of her lips with his eyes.
It’s been eleven years, he thinks. They’ve both changed so much in that span of time, physically and emotionally. He hadn’t thought of her as anything but his very best friend, but now her definition has segregated into several parts.
There’s Tao the classmate, Tao the sports buddy, Tao the Jr. chef, and most importantly, there’s Tao, his childhood best friend. The one person who knows him best more than anyone in the world.
The other important Tao is Tao the girl he grew up with that he’s only starting to realize is becoming a woman.
He leans over and brushes the hair off Tao’s face and lets his hand linger on her ear.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Sehun whispers. “Because if I did then I’ll end up losing you.”
Tao stirs and opens her eyes. When she speaks, her voice sounds hoarse seemingly from disuse.
“And you don’t think you’re hurting me now?”
“How long have you been awake?” He puts his hand down on the mattress and avoids the question.
Tao drops her gaze to his hand then stares at Sehun before saying, “Long enough.”
She’s giving him the same imploring look he’s seen on her several times and it’s only now that Sehun comprehends what it means.
“Zitao…” Sehun begins. “What if this doesn’t work out? It’ll hurt even more down the road and we’ll end up losing this.” He makes a gesture between the two of them trying to indicate what they have because now Sehun’s not even sure what it is anymore.
“It’s a risk I’d be willing to take,” she says after a while.
Sehun squeezes her hand. “Let’s just stop this,” Sehun pleads. “What we have right now is perfect.”
Tao slips her hand away from him. “Maybe for you,” Tao says, sadly. “Why won’t you take me seriously?”
“I am taking you seriously.”
“Just give this a chance.” There’s urgency in Tao’s voice. “Give me a chance.”
Sehun levels his stare with Tao’s. This is the leap right before the plane crashes with no parachute or landing in sight. This is eleven years of friendship and more right before it sparks off. He can’t move or say anything. Is this how it feels like to be swallowed whole by fear?
It takes forever before any of them says anything and it is Tao that breaks the silence.
“I see,” Tao says quietly. There’s a tear rolling off the side of her right eye and it stains her pillow. Soon, others begin to follow.
Sehun scoops her face between his hands and kisses the tears away, one by one. I’m sorry, he wants to say, but the words are stuck in his throat. He hugs her tight and lets her fall asleep crying.
---
Sehun comes over the next night and, as he lies next to Tao reminiscent of old times, Tao tells him, “You better savor this moment now because this won’t be happening for a while.”
Sehun knows she meant to say it as a joke, but it comes out heavy and sad. She had asked for some space and time apart to settle her feelings and Sehun knows he’d be an asshole if he doesn’t let her.
They lay still for a moment, side by side, before Sehun decides - fuck this. He turns his body, chest resting against Tao’s back, and loops his arms around Tao’s waist.
“Hi,” Sehun mumbles against her hair.
“What are you doing?”
“Savoring this moment just as you said.” He nuzzles his nose against her neck.
“Sehun…” Tao warns him. Don’t be selfish.
He tightens his hold around her. “Go to sleep, little spoon.”
Tao remains quiet for a while. Thirty minutes, or maybe forty, pass by before he feels her settle into rhythmic breathing. In the dim lighting of the room, Sehun’s other senses are heightened.
He realizes how much of a woman Tao is now as their bodies are aligned together - the curve of her back pressed against his chest, down to the sharp dip of her waist. She’s soft and toned at the same time, warm and alive beside him. And just before he yields to sleep, his mind lingers on what Tao said previously:
Just give this a chance, his heart whispers into the night.
I'll risk everything if it's for you
A whisper into the night
Telling me it's not my time, and don't give up
I've never stood up before
This time however I won't let go of this hand
I clutched what I cannot relinquish
- The Beginning, One OK Rock
Prompt Given: girl!Tao/Sehun - (girls!au; highschool!au {pg-13}) girl!Tao unfortunately falls in love with her bestfriend Sehun. The latter just sees her as a friend.
Notes: A huge, huge thank you to pusong_kahon for being my writing commander and for monitoring my progress, to Jam for all the help and handholding she gave me, and to mapofwords for all the brainstorming, concrit and cramming support. Some scenes were inspired by the Korean drama "Reply 1997" so if you haven't watched that then please do so. It's one of my favorites.