Extra Time (Tempo Supplementare); xiuhan 1/2
Title: Extra Time (Tempo Supplementare) 1/2
Rating: NC17
Pairing: Lu Han/Minseok
Wordcount: 13k
Warning: language, sex, random use of tenses and random switch of povs, lots of inaccuracies, unbetaed
Disclaimer: EXO belongs to themselves and SME and Man U is obviously not mine, sigh.
Notes: incredibly late lu han's bday fic
Summary: Lu Han gets a yellow card in real life, Minseok is really angry and Manchester United wins the Premier League. A football!au.
Kick-off
Minseok cheered loudly from the bleachers as his favourite team scored a point after an intense middle-field game. It was not often that he managed to snatch a few hours away from university study and the part time job necessary to pay aforementioned university. Next to him, Jongdae yawned loudly and leaned on Minseok’s shoulder. It was a little sad that the only person whom he could freely talk to in the entire university population was also probably the only one person in Manchester who did not like football, at all. In fact, Jongdae usually spent hours talking about the stupidity of football compared to the graceful and beautiful moves of fencing. Those rants usually ended with Minseok slapping his friend on the head with his very heavy Civil Law book, and Jongdae should have only thanked his lucky star that no one apart from Minseok was actually able to understand him. English hooligans could have easily beaten the poor Korean exchange student to a bloody pulp if they had only suspected he was badmouthing their favourite sport.
Even with Jongdae constantly babbling and complaining in the background, Minseok was really enjoying the game. His beloved Chelsea was winning, stupid Manchester United’s supporters were sulking, and all was well. He drowned a little in the blue scarf wrapped around his neck and sighed contently. The referee announced a substitution for the opposing team and Minseok’s perfect afternoon was totally ruined.
In the remaining thirty minutes Manchester United’s little star managed to score three times, and even managed to provide an assist for a fourth goal. It ended 4-3 for the host team.
“Who’s that guy?” asked Jongdae, almost unaware of Minseok’s bad mood. His finger pointed towards Lu Han, the overall famous, loved by anyone, extremely talented, young Chinese bomber of Manchester United football club, and also the author of his team comeback.
Minseok didn’t answer right away. He just looked at Lu Han’s smiling face while his teammates threw him up in the air and hugged him in unappropriated places. Gross.
“No one,” he answered with a sigh, then proceeded to collect his things as the referee announced the end of the game.
“He’s hot. You could have told me that there are cute Asian guys who play football in this rainy island. I would have kept you company more often during these games.”
“He’s not hot. Besides, he’s famous! His face is on every newspaper, try to read for once, you uncultured monkey!”
Jongdae made sure to bump on Minseok’s unfinished Coca cola for revenge. Minseok snarled and ran towards the exit before his supposedly best friend managed to shower him with his soft drink.
Minseok wanted nothing more than to stuff Jongdae in the first train for the suburbs, possibly before dawn.
“So are you sure you’ll be alright?” he asked with a questioning face. “You still haven’t told me where are you staying, and most important, what the fuck are you doing in Manchester all alone.”
“I’ll be fine,” answered Minseok, trying to be as reassuring and firm as possible. Once Jongdae sniffed something, he wouldn’t stop asking until he knew everything there was to know.
“It’s a girl, right?” At Minseok’s aggravate face he hastily corrected himself. “Pardon, it’s a boy, then? Who is it you’re meeting tonight?”
“You’re so loud, people will think you’re drunk and you’ll end up being robbed if you keep shouting, Jongdae.”
“Come on, tell me, we’ve been roomies for almost three years, can’t I know the name of the lucky bastard who gets to fuck your pretty ass? I want to compliment him on his deed, with your prissy attitude I thought you were doomed to die a virg-”
“Oh, look Jongdae!” Minseok quickly interrupted his tirade. “Your train has come!”
He pushed a heavily complaining Jongdae towards the carriage, and finally into the train. Then he waited for the doors to close and even started waving a white handkerchief. “Well, have a good journey Jongdae! Be a good boy and study, see you on Monday’s lecture!”
Behind the glass of the window, Jongdae was probably sputtering curses in Korean and maybe also broken English. When the train departed Minseok had already opened his cell phone to check the incoming emails.
From: ♥ Han ♥
Plaza, room 303. Tell your name to the security, they’re waiting.
He quickly discharged his blue scarf and started running towards the bus station.
Lulu hadn’t changed at all since Beijing times. Always the same infuriating smile and relaxed attitude that made Minseok want to punch him in his perfect doll face. Except Lu Han also possessed the rare ability to twist his face into the most unsexy smirks ever seen every time he remotely tried to be sensual and woo Minseok into bed, making him laugh like a hyena instead. Minseok usually tried to picture that face in his mind, not the plastic perfect angelic smile on the covers of every fucking newspaper in all England, on the phone display of every fucking girl in Minseok’s class and even on the wall behind his professor’s desk, the man being a huge fan himself.
Seemed like every soul in Manchester fucking loved Chinese football prodigy Lu Han, and the queen will probably invite him over to have some tea before the end of the championship (that Man United is, obviously, gonna win, and thanks to who?). Minseok had the luck to win an internship right in the only city in the world where everyone wanted to have a piece of his boyfriend. Without, he bitterly thought, the benefit to be actually able to see said boyfriend at least once a month. And let’s not start about the biggest joke of them all, said boyfriend not only liking a team Minseok sincerely hated, but even managing to be recruited by that team and becoming their most important player. Thank you, destiny, for playing pranks on me.
The bus dropped him near a gigantic hotel, probably terribly expensive, flashy and guarded by a handful of gorilla-sized body guards. He sneaked to the front desk ignoring the few fangirls scattered next to the principal doors hoping to get a look of their favorite players.
“I’m Kim Minseok.”
The man at the reception looked at him with a blank stare, while his co-worker rushed to see if his name was on the guest book. From their faces, Minseok could only understand they had no freaking idea who he was, nor were they waiting for him. Stupid Lu Han.
“No Kim Minseok here. Are you sure you booked the room? If not I’m afraid…”
“Try with Xiumin. Kim Xiumin. Scrap that, try Baozi.”
The girl with the guest book squealed. “Baozi Xiumin, room 303, mister Lu said he was waiting.”
“I know what Mister Lu said, thank you.”
“Wait mister, can I show you the way? Mister Baozi?”
Minseok cursed Lu Han in Korean, Chinese, English and that little bit of Japanese and French he knew while making his way towards the elevator. Fuck you, Lu Han, and your stupid nicknames. In a rage fit, he picked the blue scarf from the bag and wrapped it around his neck, making sure the team name was clearly visible. Satisfied, he stepped out of the elevator, only to be immediately spotted by one of Lu Han’s fellow teammates.
“Baozi?” The man waved at him a little too lively. He was a little drunk, probably from the victory party. A little girl run towards him and wrapped her tiny arms on his leg, the action so cute Minseok forgot for a moment to be angry for the nickname.
“Wow, did you come to see the game?” he said, eyeing their opposing team’s scarf. It was an old joke between them, since when Lu Han joined Manchester United regulars two years ago. Everyone in the team knew Lu Han’s little friend was way more than a friend, and everyone knew too well he supported another team and hated theirs. They therefore made sure to tease him, especially now that they had managed by some miracle to crush his favourite team in an official match for Champions League ranking.
Minseok swallowed some words he didn’t want to use in front of the little kid, but the man caught up anyway. “I bet you’re a little angry with us, but you only have to thank your dear friend Hannie for our win, so… Lulu, see who came to celebrate with you!”
Lu Han’s face suddenly came out of the door. His cheeks were painted with a lovely shade of pink and his eyes were a little glassed, but they snapped open in joy when he saw Minseok standing in front of the elevator.
“Minseokkie!” He launched himself towards him with open arms, then he frowned noticing the blue scarf. “Minseokkie, why are you wearing that ugly scarf when you could wear one with my colours…”
Minseok interrupted him with a kick to his shin. Not a tough one, because he still had to play a lot of games (not that Minseok cared about Manchester United or Lu Han’s games, but there were a lot of Lu Han’s teammates lurking at them, and they’d kill him if he ruined Lu Han’s leg before the end of the season).
“What’s with the baozi nickname, again?” he stormed out in rage. “I thought we were over this!”
Lu Han didn’t even try to look guilty, as usual. “But, Minseokkie, it’s true, you seem a…”
Minseok heard snickering and found half of Lu Han’s team (plus wives, girlfriends and children, obviously) staring at them from the lounge, where the little party was having place.
“Look, how cute, they’re fighting.”
There was nothing more disturbing than a dozen or so adult boys and men trying to coo him. He would have gladly stepped on their foot, probably doing no damage at all since they were as big as fucking closets and he was as tiny as a little squirrel, but just to prove his point. So fucking annoying, no surprise they were Lu Han’s friends after all.
He couldn’t really go and give them a piece of his mind, yes, even to the coach who was now debating with his second wife about his and Lu Han’s sex life, because said Lu Han was more than a little drunk and succeeding to strangle Minseok with his scarf while trying to remove it.
He pushed Lu Han away but he was quick to put an arm around his waist to avoid him falling on his nose. He counted on that nose to make a lot of money in ads and magazine covers so when Minseok would finally decide it was time to marry Lu Han they would be rich and ready to live a comfortable life.
Not that Lu Han didn’t make enough money with his football player’s wages already.
And not that Lu Han didn’t ask Minseok to marry him before, he asked him too many times to be counted. Even now, with Minseok trying to greet everyone, explaining they were going to bed, no, not that kind of going to bed, please, there are children here, because you see, Lulù is not feeling too well and preventing his boyfriend from throwing up on his new shoes, even now Lu Han was softly murmuring in Minseok’s ears how fucking beautiful he was, how he wanted him to be Lu Han’s and Lu Han’s only, how one day he’d be able to slip a ring on his tiny fingers.
And Minseok had to snatch said fingers from Lu Han’s hands before the other boy could kiss them, because the other players and their families couldn’t possibly understand a word of Chinese or Korean, but they surely understood the oddly intimate gesture of kissing your boyfriend’s ring finger. He pulled his hand away before Lu Han’s lips could grace it. They still smiled at them, knowingly. Besides, they couldn’t possibly have missed Lu Han’s hands on his butt, squeezing and kneading, nor his pitiful squeak at being manhandled.
He turned towards their laughter with his face aflame and smoke coming out of his ears, and with a quick bow, Lu Han who was still wrapped around him almost banged his head on the floor at the sudden motion, bid them goodnight.
Only when the door closed behind them on a choked “Don’t make too much noise tonight, lovey-birds,” shouted from the end of the corridor, he was finally able to let out the breath he was holding. Sure, he liked Lu Han’s friends, except for the fact they played in the wrong team, but sometimes they were a little too… overwhelming.
He turned around only to see a very resolute Lu Han flushing his poor Chelsea scarf down the toilet.
“That was absolutely not necessary, you know. And stop hiccupping for show, you’re not drunk.”
“If I were drunk you’d already be naked, trust me.”
“Yes, likewise,” he answered. “You wouldn’t be able to get it up. You tried, that summer after graduation when we went out with-”
“Ok, ok, I remember, you’re right!” Lu Han grimaced, red blotches starting to appear on his already red face. “You’ll never stop reminding me of that night, right?”
Minseok smiled, smug and evil, “Why would I? It was the first time you declared your feelings for me. In front of the entire team, of course, while I was,” he smirked, displaying his best mocking tone, “making out with my girlfriend in the toilet, of course.”
The mattress sagged when Lu Han jumped on it, crawling under the pillow and whining softly. “Please, stop, this has been a glorious day, I don’t want to be reminded of the lowest point of my life.”
Minseok stared as Lu Han sneaked out of his clothes, gaze raking over his toned body. “But I do want to remember. We wouldn’t be here, now, if that night you had kept your trap shut. We wouldn’t be together.”
Lu Han blushed for real, this time. “Come to bed?”
He sprawled himself on the mattress, hiding under a thin layer of bravado the slight embarrassment he had felt at Minseok’s words. His boyfriend wasn’t usually the reminiscing type, more prone to nagging and scolding, so he wasn’t often that Lu Han had the honour to hear some appreciation words coming from his mouth. But he had to admit it, he felt really moved to know that Minseok cherished the memory of that doomed night, despite all the awkward that the mere thought could still evoke in Lu Han’s mind.
Lu Han had fell in love with Minseok without realizing. A glance stolen in the showers after late evening practice, when steam covered the direction of his eyes and he was free to let them wander towards not really appropriate places, could have been the start. But he couldn’t really trace the starting line. He just knew that, one late afternoon, he had watched Minseok’s hair turning gold after the setting sun, beads of sweat rolling over his brow and along his neck to fall under the hem of his shirt as he ran towards his teammates to celebrate. He had just scored a goal, and Lu Han hadn’t even found the strength to run towards him, to hold him in a hug like the coach and the other players were doing. He distinctly remembered falling on the synthetic grass of the field, mind painfully focused on the path of those drops of sweat, forever lost in the alluring angles of Minseok’s collarbones. He wanted to taste them with his tongue.
He was thoroughly fucked then, and he still was. Minseok’s lips were on his before he left for his first serious, international engagement, sucking and biting and whispering, “If you ever betray me, Lu Han, if I ever have to see your face plastered on a magazine next to a blond model slut, it’s over.”
Minseok was a man of word, but there was no need, really, because Lu Han’s only love was football, and the only thing he loved more than football was Minseok. They hardly saw each other anymore, their schedules were so hectic that even meeting up like this, in the darkness of an expensive hotel suite, was a luxury. But when they were together, hard and coiled up, their bodies still fit like they were made for each other.
Minseok let his shirt fall on the chair and joined him on the bed.
First Half
She’s tall, thin, and tall. Both her blonde hair and plump lips are perfect, but probably fake. Freakishly tall. The heels help, but Lu Han is taller than Minseok and she’s definitely taller than Lu Han. Minseok would probably look like a dwarf, next to her, a very grumpy dwarf, if the grimace plastered on his face is anything to go by.
The tabloid is hastily snatched from his hand by a very excited Jongdae. “Hey, look at this!” he says, fingers pointing to the boy captured next to the showgirl. The picture is blurry, and Minseok doesn’t even want to think about what that paparazzo went through in order to elude the hotel’s perfect security and take this photo, nor how much money did he make with a similar photo. After all, is not every day that Lu Han, young star of MU football club, lets himself be busted with his new flame. “Isn’t this the dude we saw the other day? The one you wanted to choke with your own hands after those three goals?”
Minseok doesn’t even hear him, too focused on the words rolling under his eyes.
This is a first, declaims the article. We finally got a glimpse of the secret love life of the most enigmatic player of this season. Lu Han has always chosen to protect his privacy, but we managed to bust him, enjoying a romantic date with Julia B. Then follows a three page article reporting Lu Han’s and the girl’s biographies and a lot of more or less probable theories about their first encounter and their so-called relationship. She’s a Swiss runway model, former girlfriend of a couple of other football player and the captain of Germany water polo captain, she has acted in two or three TV serial with minor roles, never showing an astounding talent, and she’s now hosting a popular talk show. Oh, and now looks like she has a new boyfriend. Minseok’s one, to be accurate.
Swallowing a curse, he throws the magazine, managing to hit Jongdae’s head. His friend can enjoy the gossip, but he’s done with this shit.
He’s in full anger stage, he wants to strangle Lu Han and cut him in pieces, burn the pieces and dump the ashes in a garbage bin. His cell phone rings, he instantly recognizes the familiar jingle of Lu Han’s energy drink spot, the one he can’t stop but whistle in the shower. The display shows Lulu, framed by little hearts. He turns off the phone and throws it into the bag, where hopefully it can get lost in between his Business Transactions materials.
When he hears Jongdae’s shrill cry of “Oh, god, Minseok, you won’t believe it! Here it says she’s pregnant!” he’s already crying.
He doesn’t answer Lu Han’s calls and texts for the rest of the week. By Saturday, he’s already bought himself a new phone and has exchanged numbers with his university colleagues, professors and his new friends, but he doesn’t trust any of his old, high school friends back in Seoul, nor the ones in Beijing, with his new number. They know Lu Han, and he isn’t sure they wouldn’t trade Minseok’s new number for VIP tickets for some games, or signed t-shirts that Lu Han would give them anyway.
He knows he’s behaving like a spoiled child, and he should listen to what Lu Han has to say. He owes him at least that, but he doesn’t want to listen.
The truth is, Minseok has been preparing himself for this dreadful moment for the last five years, from the first time Lu Han came to him with serious eyes, saying that he’d been scouted by a Bundesliga team. It’s not that he doubts the extent of Lu Han’s feelings, but Lu Han lives a different life now, he holds the world in his palm. Why should he limit himself to little, plain Kim Minseok when he can have Julia B., or Melissa P., why should he want the boring grad student with an obscure PhD when he can have the most beautiful girls of the world? Even though Lu Han truly loves him, Kim Minseok is nothing compared to the shiny life of a superstar. Lu Han was bound to become famous; he had the talent, the looks, the determination, he has everything he wants now, but Kim Minseok has only one heart, and it’s better if he can rescue it before that thrilling, maddening race that had been his and Lu Han’s relationship comes to an end with a mortal crash.
Minseok can deal with the secret escapades in the middle of the night every once in a while, he can deal with girls lusting over Lu Han’s body, he can deal with the lonely nights in his giant bed while his boyfriend is flying towards Paris, Milan, Berlin. But he can’t deal with this. The suspect, the fear, the excruciating pain. He wasn’t joking, that day at Incheon international airport, when he had kissed Lu Han. “If you ever betray me, Lu Han, if I ever have to see your face plastered on a magazine next to a blond model slut, it’s over.” And now it’s over, no second thoughts.
“He’s desperate, you know, and you’re being a shit to him.”
Yixing’s voice is distorted by bad wifi connection, and his face is just a vaguely human shaped pixel squares, but he still manages to be annoying. Minseok has the inexplicable, compelling urge to click on the red icon and end this awkward skype conversation, but Yixing is his friend as well as Lu Han’s and he doesn’t want to be robbed of the right to talk with his own friends. Yet Yixing is Lu Han’s best friend, which means that Minseok can’t expect him to be neutral and not to take sides on this matter, even though it’d be very considerate on his part.
“I’m sure that his new friend will be able to comfort him on different levels,” he answers, trying to sound non- committal and ending up surly.
“Minseok,” warns Yixing, but he cuts his friend before he can continue with his ‘let’s defend Lu Han at every cost’ crusade, “It’s strange how Lu Han was the one who cheated, and yet everyone is dying to root for him. I’m your friend too, and I’m suffering a lot but no one cares!”
“Come on Minseok, Minseok, shit…”
The software goes offline with a pop, and Minseok shuts down the laptop furiously and crawls under the covers. In the tiny space of his student flat, he’s safe. He just transferred to his new apartment three months ago, and Lu Han never had the time to pay him a visit, nor does he know the address. He quickly scans his old phone before he tries to get some sleep, but he’s flooded by an endless string of messages and missed calls. It’s almost always the same person.
Minseok cries himself to sleep and dreams of stage lights, football jerseys and the line of Lu Han’s brow.
When he wakes up it’s late in the morning and he’s completely missed the first lesson, the second starting in less than five minutes. It’s not even worth the fuss of getting up anymore, so he sends a quick message to Jongdae, hoping that his friend will be kind enough to cover for him and report his absence to their referent for the project.
Destiny is against him, this morning. Minseok hates silence, usually prefers to have his breakfast immersed in the professional chattering of news announcers. It’s both a way to keep updated with the rest of the world and a temporary palliative against the loneliness of the bachelor life. Not that he was a bachelor until a few days ago, but with the frequency Lu Han visited his apartment in the last few months, he might as well have been. Well, now he is, and the thought is sour and black as the coffee in the pot, smoking and spreading his strong aroma around the little kitchen. The urge to turn on the television, the radio, even a news streaming on his laptop is overwhelming, but Minseok doesn’t want to inadvertently trip into a rerun of the news about Lu Han’s recent romantic activities, and in the end he decides that the void feeling he’d feel if he saw just another photo of that blonde, impossibly sexy girl hanging out with his ex-boyfriend would be one hundred per cent worse than the stinging cold he feels at the empty sound of his silent life.
It’s the wrong decision, really. If he had listened to the morning news, he wouldn’t have missed the news of a very famous football player visiting his university and threatening a poor exchange grad student from Korea in order to obtain a tiny piece of information and three minutes alone with Jongdae’s smartphone.
The press can’t obviously know what the visit was about, and when Lu Han finally leaves the campus, after shaking hands and signing a t-shirt for basically everyone, Kim Jongdae is too shocked to be actually able to speak with the crowd of invading journalists who wish to know every single word that has been pronounced in the empty classroom.
They’re so busy flooding Jongdae’s mind with excited questions that they can’t notice the real star disappearing in an alley after having changed in a brandless jacket, sunglasses and the most anonymous cap ever.
Minseok doesn’t know, but he receives a message from Jongdae, asking if he’s alright and saying that he’ll come to check on him in the afternoon. The spelling is a little strange for his friend, who never uses smileys, nor any text slang, because he just is that kind of stuck-up person who cares too much about correct grammar. Minseok notices, but he’s at his third spoon of chocolate ice cream and the opening of his favourite Korean drama, deluxe dvd box, one of his most precious possessions, is rolling.
He dismisses the message and files the lack of proper Korean grammar in his Jongdae’s Quirks list, reminding himself to make himself presentable for Jongdae’s visit after the episode ends.
The fact that this is one of Lu Han’s favourite dramas and the dvd box was a gift for their third anniversary is carved in giant, fat capital letters in his mind, but this is his only known recipe for grey days and he doesn’t know what else he can do to chase the shade of sadness away from his heart.
Minseok’s doorbell rings, interrupting the fourth episode right during the climax with a rusty, dull sound. Minseok’s good intentions, his plan of getting up, throwing the empty ice cream bucket away and at least washing his face so that Jongdae doesn’t end up pitying him more than he already does, have been forgotten more or less at the same moment they were professed. Unfortunately it’s too late now, and he rushes towards the bathroom to check his tired face in the middle, taking in the terrifying image of his blotchy eyes and matted hair. The doorbell rings again, and Minseok curses loudly, “Fuck Jongdae, can’t you wait a fucking moment?”
He’s still in the middle of combing his hair with nervous fingers when he finally opens the door, not even bothering to look in the peephole.
“What the hell, Jongdae, what was so urgent that you had to come here and ring the damn bell like-” He freezes, the words dying in his throat. He recognizes the soft, fascinating lines of Lu Han face even under the mask and sunglasses, though he can’t make out his expression.
His first instinct is to slam the door in his face and hide, but Lu Han is quicker, sneaking his foot in the doorway and yelping when it gets stuck in the door, keeping it open. Minseok pulls harder, but Lu Han is already halfway inside and forcing himself onto the door with his entire weight until he finally tumbles on the floor of the flat dragging Minseok down with him, while the door snaps closed.
Familiar Korean voices are still filling the apartment, the dvd rolling in the living room, and Minseok breathes in the even more familiar cologne he himself has gifted Lu Han last Christmas.
“Hey,” is Lu Han’s only greeting, half-murmured, half-sighed against the column of Minseok’s neck, and it isn’t fair the way even that single word make him shiver, like his body has been missing the comfort and the weight of Lu Han’s love and it’s now craving it. Minseok tries to snap out of his Lu Han induced gaze, managing to spit a meek, “I didn’t say you could enter.”
“Yeah, you’re angry, I got it. You know, the week you spent ignoring my calls kinda sold you away.”
“Please go away,” it’s Minseok answer, but at the same time the hands that should’ve pushed Lu Han tangle in his hair and drag him closer. “Please, let me explain,” is what Lu Han says instead.
The kettle whistles and neither Lu Han, nor Minseok, have talked yet. The latter is grumpily eyeing his collection of precious, expensive tea like it’s its fault that Lu Han is still there and not in hell where he belongs, while the former is hesitantly looking at the apartment for the first time, taking in the little pieces of Asia that Minseok has strategically placed inside the house to make it more personal, to bring a little home in his grey Manchester house. It’s a pity that he didn’t come here before the breakup, he would’ve seen our together photos hanging from every wall, thinks Minseok, still referring to the awful incident as a breakup even though they haven’t broken up officially, yet, adds his venomous mind. Maybe it’s a good thing that Lu Han is here. Minseok can finally lift this weight from his shoulders.
“Nice place,” is what Lu Han settles for in the end, immediately finding his chair and gesturing for Minseok to sit as well. Minseok serves the tea, but doesn’t sit. He prefers to stand, the higher position giving him some sort of psychological advantage over Lu Han.
He still doesn’t talk, leaving to Lu Han the burden to start their conversation. It’s the least he can do, after having barged in Minseok’s lair of peace like this. He feels Lu Han’s worried stare on the back of his neck while he opens the drawer to take a box of biscuits. He knows he looks like a mess, but Lu Han isn’t coping any better, he reasons in triumph, gaze slowly sliding over his tired face and distinctly visible eye bags.
Lu Han waits too long to break the silence, not speaking until Minseok’s eyes flutter shut behind the mug to drink his last sip of tea. “I didn’t cheat on you,” is what he says. Not I’m sorry or, It was a mistake, like Minseok was expecting. He thinks he deserves at least a Please forgive me.
But Lu Han is there, looking perfectly distressed and wronged, the image of innocence against the firm and cold set of Minseok’s lips. He almost feel like the one at fault, and it isn’t fair that everyone is behaving like Minseok is the bad one and Lu Han a poor victim of the circumstances.
He can barely keep the contempt out of his voice. “You didn’t?”
“Minseok,” and Lu Han now is pleading, soft and convincing, “you can’t jump to conclusions like that without even hearing my version, you know that I love you and I’d never cheat on you. Why would I need to go with some other girl when you’ve always been everything I’ve ever wanted?”
He almost expected his voice to sound more petulant and whiny, and now he’d give anything to find a single fault in Lu Han’s behaviour, the tiniest, microscopic hint that the other boy is hiding something from him, that he’s feeling guilty. Unfortunately, his voice doesn’t waver, his eyes are calm and hard, filled with the brim with sincerity, and Minseok knows him, has known him long enough to read Lu Han’s lies in the lines of his face. Still, he refuses to believe him. He wants to, he knows he have to, but there’s no way that anyone would choose Kim Minseok over Julia B, and Lu Han isn’t any different. He must be lying.
His eyes travel around the room in search of an argument he can use against Lu Han’s sincerity.
“You’re still not giving me any explanation,” he replies, taking one of the magazines he’s bought in the last few days and throwing it at Lu Han’s face, “you were fucking kissing her, Han!”
He forces his eyes to stay dry, but the very first tear makes its way out of his right eye, rolling delicately against his cheek, and he can’t stop the following either.
Lu Han gets up and tries to caress his face, but Minseok edges away and in the end he can only give him a tissue to wipe his face, as he waits for the Korean boy to calm down.
“Minseok,” he says with a pained voice, putting is hand on Minseok’s shoulder and forcing his head up to look in his eyes, “I have an explanation, but it’s no use saying it if you don’t trust me from the beginning. What happened to us? I always put you first, before anyone else. You have no reason to doubt my real feelings. There’s nothing between me and her and I didn’t kiss her.”
He opens his mouth to protest as vehemently as he can, but Lu Han shuts him up with a finger on his mouth. “I wasn’t kissing her, believe me, I was merely just talking with her. Look,” he says’, pointing to the grainy black and white photos, “look at this! The angle is all wrong, you know that’s not the way I kiss.”
Minseok feels compelled to look at the photo. It’s something he loathes to do, and even when the article came up he didn’t spared it more than a quick look because it was simply too painful for him. Now, as his eyes follow the movement of Lu Han’s fingers along the lines of the two people in the photo, he realizes that something is indeed quite wrong. The photo has probably been mirrored, and the angle of Lu Han’s body is quite strange to look at. Lu Han’s right hand snatches his own, while the other creeps higher to cup his neck.
“You know me thoroughly, Minseok, and you know that if I really had wanted to kiss her I wouldn’t have done it like this. I would’ve put my hand here,” he says, splaying his fingers on Minseok’s nape, “and the other one here,” he says, tickling his throat and lifting his head higher until he's speaking on Minseok's lips. “And then I would’ve tilted my head like this, with my eyes shut, because I already know your face better than anything else but it’s still incredibly distracting and I wouldn’t be able to kiss you properly if I were lost in your eyes.”
Minseok feels himself hyperventilating, failing to grasp how Lu Han could have travelled so fast around the table. A moment ago, he was showing Minseok the photo, and now he feels the hard edge of the table behind him, and even harder edge of Lu Han’s body, chiselled by years of training, pinning him down, their mouths mere centimetres apart. Lu Han scatters his will to resist away with little effort, stripping Minseok of his insecurities and doubts, and then leaves him hanging.
Minseok is still waiting for their lips to press together, for the taste of Lu Han's tongue in his own, when Lu Han steps away. “I can’t do this,” he says, looking unsure. “I called and called, but you thought… and you didn’t even ask me but you started avoiding me. I thought we had something special, but to think that you’d thrown away everything without even giving me a chance to explain… I can’t do this, Minseok.”
Minseok wants to stop him, wants to make hot chocolate and sit on the couch and tell Lu Han everything. How he thinks he’s not enough, how he thinks Lu Han deserves better, how there are girls and boys more beautiful, smarter, more fit to be seen in Lu Han’s company than he is.
He follows Lu Han at the door, but he doesn’t say anything and it’s Lu Han who talks, in the end. “I think we should take a break,” he says, “just a couple of days. No, no, no, no. Don’t look at me like that, dearie, I’m not dumping you, but I think you need to reflect and think about us, and I need it too.”
Minseok doesn’t realize he’s crying, again. Maybe he’s never stopped since that weak, traitorous first tear in the kitchen. “Wait!” he manages to choke out, just as Lu Han’s hand grazes the door handle, “Please, I believe you. Just… stay a little more.”
Second Half＞＞
A/N at the end of part 2 ♥
Rating: NC17
Pairing: Lu Han/Minseok
Wordcount: 13k
Warning: language, sex, random use of tenses and random switch of povs, lots of inaccuracies, unbetaed
Disclaimer: EXO belongs to themselves and SME and Man U is obviously not mine, sigh.
Notes: incredibly late lu han's bday fic
Summary: Lu Han gets a yellow card in real life, Minseok is really angry and Manchester United wins the Premier League. A football!au.
Kick-off
Minseok cheered loudly from the bleachers as his favourite team scored a point after an intense middle-field game. It was not often that he managed to snatch a few hours away from university study and the part time job necessary to pay aforementioned university. Next to him, Jongdae yawned loudly and leaned on Minseok’s shoulder. It was a little sad that the only person whom he could freely talk to in the entire university population was also probably the only one person in Manchester who did not like football, at all. In fact, Jongdae usually spent hours talking about the stupidity of football compared to the graceful and beautiful moves of fencing. Those rants usually ended with Minseok slapping his friend on the head with his very heavy Civil Law book, and Jongdae should have only thanked his lucky star that no one apart from Minseok was actually able to understand him. English hooligans could have easily beaten the poor Korean exchange student to a bloody pulp if they had only suspected he was badmouthing their favourite sport.
Even with Jongdae constantly babbling and complaining in the background, Minseok was really enjoying the game. His beloved Chelsea was winning, stupid Manchester United’s supporters were sulking, and all was well. He drowned a little in the blue scarf wrapped around his neck and sighed contently. The referee announced a substitution for the opposing team and Minseok’s perfect afternoon was totally ruined.
In the remaining thirty minutes Manchester United’s little star managed to score three times, and even managed to provide an assist for a fourth goal. It ended 4-3 for the host team.
“Who’s that guy?” asked Jongdae, almost unaware of Minseok’s bad mood. His finger pointed towards Lu Han, the overall famous, loved by anyone, extremely talented, young Chinese bomber of Manchester United football club, and also the author of his team comeback.
Minseok didn’t answer right away. He just looked at Lu Han’s smiling face while his teammates threw him up in the air and hugged him in unappropriated places. Gross.
“No one,” he answered with a sigh, then proceeded to collect his things as the referee announced the end of the game.
“He’s hot. You could have told me that there are cute Asian guys who play football in this rainy island. I would have kept you company more often during these games.”
“He’s not hot. Besides, he’s famous! His face is on every newspaper, try to read for once, you uncultured monkey!”
Jongdae made sure to bump on Minseok’s unfinished Coca cola for revenge. Minseok snarled and ran towards the exit before his supposedly best friend managed to shower him with his soft drink.
Minseok wanted nothing more than to stuff Jongdae in the first train for the suburbs, possibly before dawn.
“So are you sure you’ll be alright?” he asked with a questioning face. “You still haven’t told me where are you staying, and most important, what the fuck are you doing in Manchester all alone.”
“I’ll be fine,” answered Minseok, trying to be as reassuring and firm as possible. Once Jongdae sniffed something, he wouldn’t stop asking until he knew everything there was to know.
“It’s a girl, right?” At Minseok’s aggravate face he hastily corrected himself. “Pardon, it’s a boy, then? Who is it you’re meeting tonight?”
“You’re so loud, people will think you’re drunk and you’ll end up being robbed if you keep shouting, Jongdae.”
“Come on, tell me, we’ve been roomies for almost three years, can’t I know the name of the lucky bastard who gets to fuck your pretty ass? I want to compliment him on his deed, with your prissy attitude I thought you were doomed to die a virg-”
“Oh, look Jongdae!” Minseok quickly interrupted his tirade. “Your train has come!”
He pushed a heavily complaining Jongdae towards the carriage, and finally into the train. Then he waited for the doors to close and even started waving a white handkerchief. “Well, have a good journey Jongdae! Be a good boy and study, see you on Monday’s lecture!”
Behind the glass of the window, Jongdae was probably sputtering curses in Korean and maybe also broken English. When the train departed Minseok had already opened his cell phone to check the incoming emails.
From: ♥ Han ♥
Plaza, room 303. Tell your name to the security, they’re waiting.
He quickly discharged his blue scarf and started running towards the bus station.
Lulu hadn’t changed at all since Beijing times. Always the same infuriating smile and relaxed attitude that made Minseok want to punch him in his perfect doll face. Except Lu Han also possessed the rare ability to twist his face into the most unsexy smirks ever seen every time he remotely tried to be sensual and woo Minseok into bed, making him laugh like a hyena instead. Minseok usually tried to picture that face in his mind, not the plastic perfect angelic smile on the covers of every fucking newspaper in all England, on the phone display of every fucking girl in Minseok’s class and even on the wall behind his professor’s desk, the man being a huge fan himself.
Seemed like every soul in Manchester fucking loved Chinese football prodigy Lu Han, and the queen will probably invite him over to have some tea before the end of the championship (that Man United is, obviously, gonna win, and thanks to who?). Minseok had the luck to win an internship right in the only city in the world where everyone wanted to have a piece of his boyfriend. Without, he bitterly thought, the benefit to be actually able to see said boyfriend at least once a month. And let’s not start about the biggest joke of them all, said boyfriend not only liking a team Minseok sincerely hated, but even managing to be recruited by that team and becoming their most important player. Thank you, destiny, for playing pranks on me.
The bus dropped him near a gigantic hotel, probably terribly expensive, flashy and guarded by a handful of gorilla-sized body guards. He sneaked to the front desk ignoring the few fangirls scattered next to the principal doors hoping to get a look of their favorite players.
“I’m Kim Minseok.”
The man at the reception looked at him with a blank stare, while his co-worker rushed to see if his name was on the guest book. From their faces, Minseok could only understand they had no freaking idea who he was, nor were they waiting for him. Stupid Lu Han.
“No Kim Minseok here. Are you sure you booked the room? If not I’m afraid…”
“Try with Xiumin. Kim Xiumin. Scrap that, try Baozi.”
The girl with the guest book squealed. “Baozi Xiumin, room 303, mister Lu said he was waiting.”
“I know what Mister Lu said, thank you.”
“Wait mister, can I show you the way? Mister Baozi?”
Minseok cursed Lu Han in Korean, Chinese, English and that little bit of Japanese and French he knew while making his way towards the elevator. Fuck you, Lu Han, and your stupid nicknames. In a rage fit, he picked the blue scarf from the bag and wrapped it around his neck, making sure the team name was clearly visible. Satisfied, he stepped out of the elevator, only to be immediately spotted by one of Lu Han’s fellow teammates.
“Baozi?” The man waved at him a little too lively. He was a little drunk, probably from the victory party. A little girl run towards him and wrapped her tiny arms on his leg, the action so cute Minseok forgot for a moment to be angry for the nickname.
“Wow, did you come to see the game?” he said, eyeing their opposing team’s scarf. It was an old joke between them, since when Lu Han joined Manchester United regulars two years ago. Everyone in the team knew Lu Han’s little friend was way more than a friend, and everyone knew too well he supported another team and hated theirs. They therefore made sure to tease him, especially now that they had managed by some miracle to crush his favourite team in an official match for Champions League ranking.
Minseok swallowed some words he didn’t want to use in front of the little kid, but the man caught up anyway. “I bet you’re a little angry with us, but you only have to thank your dear friend Hannie for our win, so… Lulu, see who came to celebrate with you!”
Lu Han’s face suddenly came out of the door. His cheeks were painted with a lovely shade of pink and his eyes were a little glassed, but they snapped open in joy when he saw Minseok standing in front of the elevator.
“Minseokkie!” He launched himself towards him with open arms, then he frowned noticing the blue scarf. “Minseokkie, why are you wearing that ugly scarf when you could wear one with my colours…”
Minseok interrupted him with a kick to his shin. Not a tough one, because he still had to play a lot of games (not that Minseok cared about Manchester United or Lu Han’s games, but there were a lot of Lu Han’s teammates lurking at them, and they’d kill him if he ruined Lu Han’s leg before the end of the season).
“What’s with the baozi nickname, again?” he stormed out in rage. “I thought we were over this!”
Lu Han didn’t even try to look guilty, as usual. “But, Minseokkie, it’s true, you seem a…”
Minseok heard snickering and found half of Lu Han’s team (plus wives, girlfriends and children, obviously) staring at them from the lounge, where the little party was having place.
“Look, how cute, they’re fighting.”
There was nothing more disturbing than a dozen or so adult boys and men trying to coo him. He would have gladly stepped on their foot, probably doing no damage at all since they were as big as fucking closets and he was as tiny as a little squirrel, but just to prove his point. So fucking annoying, no surprise they were Lu Han’s friends after all.
He couldn’t really go and give them a piece of his mind, yes, even to the coach who was now debating with his second wife about his and Lu Han’s sex life, because said Lu Han was more than a little drunk and succeeding to strangle Minseok with his scarf while trying to remove it.
He pushed Lu Han away but he was quick to put an arm around his waist to avoid him falling on his nose. He counted on that nose to make a lot of money in ads and magazine covers so when Minseok would finally decide it was time to marry Lu Han they would be rich and ready to live a comfortable life.
Not that Lu Han didn’t make enough money with his football player’s wages already.
And not that Lu Han didn’t ask Minseok to marry him before, he asked him too many times to be counted. Even now, with Minseok trying to greet everyone, explaining they were going to bed, no, not that kind of going to bed, please, there are children here, because you see, Lulù is not feeling too well and preventing his boyfriend from throwing up on his new shoes, even now Lu Han was softly murmuring in Minseok’s ears how fucking beautiful he was, how he wanted him to be Lu Han’s and Lu Han’s only, how one day he’d be able to slip a ring on his tiny fingers.
And Minseok had to snatch said fingers from Lu Han’s hands before the other boy could kiss them, because the other players and their families couldn’t possibly understand a word of Chinese or Korean, but they surely understood the oddly intimate gesture of kissing your boyfriend’s ring finger. He pulled his hand away before Lu Han’s lips could grace it. They still smiled at them, knowingly. Besides, they couldn’t possibly have missed Lu Han’s hands on his butt, squeezing and kneading, nor his pitiful squeak at being manhandled.
He turned towards their laughter with his face aflame and smoke coming out of his ears, and with a quick bow, Lu Han who was still wrapped around him almost banged his head on the floor at the sudden motion, bid them goodnight.
Only when the door closed behind them on a choked “Don’t make too much noise tonight, lovey-birds,” shouted from the end of the corridor, he was finally able to let out the breath he was holding. Sure, he liked Lu Han’s friends, except for the fact they played in the wrong team, but sometimes they were a little too… overwhelming.
He turned around only to see a very resolute Lu Han flushing his poor Chelsea scarf down the toilet.
“That was absolutely not necessary, you know. And stop hiccupping for show, you’re not drunk.”
“If I were drunk you’d already be naked, trust me.”
“Yes, likewise,” he answered. “You wouldn’t be able to get it up. You tried, that summer after graduation when we went out with-”
“Ok, ok, I remember, you’re right!” Lu Han grimaced, red blotches starting to appear on his already red face. “You’ll never stop reminding me of that night, right?”
Minseok smiled, smug and evil, “Why would I? It was the first time you declared your feelings for me. In front of the entire team, of course, while I was,” he smirked, displaying his best mocking tone, “making out with my girlfriend in the toilet, of course.”
The mattress sagged when Lu Han jumped on it, crawling under the pillow and whining softly. “Please, stop, this has been a glorious day, I don’t want to be reminded of the lowest point of my life.”
Minseok stared as Lu Han sneaked out of his clothes, gaze raking over his toned body. “But I do want to remember. We wouldn’t be here, now, if that night you had kept your trap shut. We wouldn’t be together.”
Lu Han blushed for real, this time. “Come to bed?”
He sprawled himself on the mattress, hiding under a thin layer of bravado the slight embarrassment he had felt at Minseok’s words. His boyfriend wasn’t usually the reminiscing type, more prone to nagging and scolding, so he wasn’t often that Lu Han had the honour to hear some appreciation words coming from his mouth. But he had to admit it, he felt really moved to know that Minseok cherished the memory of that doomed night, despite all the awkward that the mere thought could still evoke in Lu Han’s mind.
Lu Han had fell in love with Minseok without realizing. A glance stolen in the showers after late evening practice, when steam covered the direction of his eyes and he was free to let them wander towards not really appropriate places, could have been the start. But he couldn’t really trace the starting line. He just knew that, one late afternoon, he had watched Minseok’s hair turning gold after the setting sun, beads of sweat rolling over his brow and along his neck to fall under the hem of his shirt as he ran towards his teammates to celebrate. He had just scored a goal, and Lu Han hadn’t even found the strength to run towards him, to hold him in a hug like the coach and the other players were doing. He distinctly remembered falling on the synthetic grass of the field, mind painfully focused on the path of those drops of sweat, forever lost in the alluring angles of Minseok’s collarbones. He wanted to taste them with his tongue.
He was thoroughly fucked then, and he still was. Minseok’s lips were on his before he left for his first serious, international engagement, sucking and biting and whispering, “If you ever betray me, Lu Han, if I ever have to see your face plastered on a magazine next to a blond model slut, it’s over.”
Minseok was a man of word, but there was no need, really, because Lu Han’s only love was football, and the only thing he loved more than football was Minseok. They hardly saw each other anymore, their schedules were so hectic that even meeting up like this, in the darkness of an expensive hotel suite, was a luxury. But when they were together, hard and coiled up, their bodies still fit like they were made for each other.
Minseok let his shirt fall on the chair and joined him on the bed.
First Half
She’s tall, thin, and tall. Both her blonde hair and plump lips are perfect, but probably fake. Freakishly tall. The heels help, but Lu Han is taller than Minseok and she’s definitely taller than Lu Han. Minseok would probably look like a dwarf, next to her, a very grumpy dwarf, if the grimace plastered on his face is anything to go by.
The tabloid is hastily snatched from his hand by a very excited Jongdae. “Hey, look at this!” he says, fingers pointing to the boy captured next to the showgirl. The picture is blurry, and Minseok doesn’t even want to think about what that paparazzo went through in order to elude the hotel’s perfect security and take this photo, nor how much money did he make with a similar photo. After all, is not every day that Lu Han, young star of MU football club, lets himself be busted with his new flame. “Isn’t this the dude we saw the other day? The one you wanted to choke with your own hands after those three goals?”
Minseok doesn’t even hear him, too focused on the words rolling under his eyes.
This is a first, declaims the article. We finally got a glimpse of the secret love life of the most enigmatic player of this season. Lu Han has always chosen to protect his privacy, but we managed to bust him, enjoying a romantic date with Julia B. Then follows a three page article reporting Lu Han’s and the girl’s biographies and a lot of more or less probable theories about their first encounter and their so-called relationship. She’s a Swiss runway model, former girlfriend of a couple of other football player and the captain of Germany water polo captain, she has acted in two or three TV serial with minor roles, never showing an astounding talent, and she’s now hosting a popular talk show. Oh, and now looks like she has a new boyfriend. Minseok’s one, to be accurate.
Swallowing a curse, he throws the magazine, managing to hit Jongdae’s head. His friend can enjoy the gossip, but he’s done with this shit.
He’s in full anger stage, he wants to strangle Lu Han and cut him in pieces, burn the pieces and dump the ashes in a garbage bin. His cell phone rings, he instantly recognizes the familiar jingle of Lu Han’s energy drink spot, the one he can’t stop but whistle in the shower. The display shows Lulu, framed by little hearts. He turns off the phone and throws it into the bag, where hopefully it can get lost in between his Business Transactions materials.
When he hears Jongdae’s shrill cry of “Oh, god, Minseok, you won’t believe it! Here it says she’s pregnant!” he’s already crying.
He doesn’t answer Lu Han’s calls and texts for the rest of the week. By Saturday, he’s already bought himself a new phone and has exchanged numbers with his university colleagues, professors and his new friends, but he doesn’t trust any of his old, high school friends back in Seoul, nor the ones in Beijing, with his new number. They know Lu Han, and he isn’t sure they wouldn’t trade Minseok’s new number for VIP tickets for some games, or signed t-shirts that Lu Han would give them anyway.
He knows he’s behaving like a spoiled child, and he should listen to what Lu Han has to say. He owes him at least that, but he doesn’t want to listen.
The truth is, Minseok has been preparing himself for this dreadful moment for the last five years, from the first time Lu Han came to him with serious eyes, saying that he’d been scouted by a Bundesliga team. It’s not that he doubts the extent of Lu Han’s feelings, but Lu Han lives a different life now, he holds the world in his palm. Why should he limit himself to little, plain Kim Minseok when he can have Julia B., or Melissa P., why should he want the boring grad student with an obscure PhD when he can have the most beautiful girls of the world? Even though Lu Han truly loves him, Kim Minseok is nothing compared to the shiny life of a superstar. Lu Han was bound to become famous; he had the talent, the looks, the determination, he has everything he wants now, but Kim Minseok has only one heart, and it’s better if he can rescue it before that thrilling, maddening race that had been his and Lu Han’s relationship comes to an end with a mortal crash.
Minseok can deal with the secret escapades in the middle of the night every once in a while, he can deal with girls lusting over Lu Han’s body, he can deal with the lonely nights in his giant bed while his boyfriend is flying towards Paris, Milan, Berlin. But he can’t deal with this. The suspect, the fear, the excruciating pain. He wasn’t joking, that day at Incheon international airport, when he had kissed Lu Han. “If you ever betray me, Lu Han, if I ever have to see your face plastered on a magazine next to a blond model slut, it’s over.” And now it’s over, no second thoughts.
“He’s desperate, you know, and you’re being a shit to him.”
Yixing’s voice is distorted by bad wifi connection, and his face is just a vaguely human shaped pixel squares, but he still manages to be annoying. Minseok has the inexplicable, compelling urge to click on the red icon and end this awkward skype conversation, but Yixing is his friend as well as Lu Han’s and he doesn’t want to be robbed of the right to talk with his own friends. Yet Yixing is Lu Han’s best friend, which means that Minseok can’t expect him to be neutral and not to take sides on this matter, even though it’d be very considerate on his part.
“I’m sure that his new friend will be able to comfort him on different levels,” he answers, trying to sound non- committal and ending up surly.
“Minseok,” warns Yixing, but he cuts his friend before he can continue with his ‘let’s defend Lu Han at every cost’ crusade, “It’s strange how Lu Han was the one who cheated, and yet everyone is dying to root for him. I’m your friend too, and I’m suffering a lot but no one cares!”
“Come on Minseok, Minseok, shit…”
The software goes offline with a pop, and Minseok shuts down the laptop furiously and crawls under the covers. In the tiny space of his student flat, he’s safe. He just transferred to his new apartment three months ago, and Lu Han never had the time to pay him a visit, nor does he know the address. He quickly scans his old phone before he tries to get some sleep, but he’s flooded by an endless string of messages and missed calls. It’s almost always the same person.
Minseok cries himself to sleep and dreams of stage lights, football jerseys and the line of Lu Han’s brow.
When he wakes up it’s late in the morning and he’s completely missed the first lesson, the second starting in less than five minutes. It’s not even worth the fuss of getting up anymore, so he sends a quick message to Jongdae, hoping that his friend will be kind enough to cover for him and report his absence to their referent for the project.
Destiny is against him, this morning. Minseok hates silence, usually prefers to have his breakfast immersed in the professional chattering of news announcers. It’s both a way to keep updated with the rest of the world and a temporary palliative against the loneliness of the bachelor life. Not that he was a bachelor until a few days ago, but with the frequency Lu Han visited his apartment in the last few months, he might as well have been. Well, now he is, and the thought is sour and black as the coffee in the pot, smoking and spreading his strong aroma around the little kitchen. The urge to turn on the television, the radio, even a news streaming on his laptop is overwhelming, but Minseok doesn’t want to inadvertently trip into a rerun of the news about Lu Han’s recent romantic activities, and in the end he decides that the void feeling he’d feel if he saw just another photo of that blonde, impossibly sexy girl hanging out with his ex-boyfriend would be one hundred per cent worse than the stinging cold he feels at the empty sound of his silent life.
It’s the wrong decision, really. If he had listened to the morning news, he wouldn’t have missed the news of a very famous football player visiting his university and threatening a poor exchange grad student from Korea in order to obtain a tiny piece of information and three minutes alone with Jongdae’s smartphone.
The press can’t obviously know what the visit was about, and when Lu Han finally leaves the campus, after shaking hands and signing a t-shirt for basically everyone, Kim Jongdae is too shocked to be actually able to speak with the crowd of invading journalists who wish to know every single word that has been pronounced in the empty classroom.
They’re so busy flooding Jongdae’s mind with excited questions that they can’t notice the real star disappearing in an alley after having changed in a brandless jacket, sunglasses and the most anonymous cap ever.
Minseok doesn’t know, but he receives a message from Jongdae, asking if he’s alright and saying that he’ll come to check on him in the afternoon. The spelling is a little strange for his friend, who never uses smileys, nor any text slang, because he just is that kind of stuck-up person who cares too much about correct grammar. Minseok notices, but he’s at his third spoon of chocolate ice cream and the opening of his favourite Korean drama, deluxe dvd box, one of his most precious possessions, is rolling.
He dismisses the message and files the lack of proper Korean grammar in his Jongdae’s Quirks list, reminding himself to make himself presentable for Jongdae’s visit after the episode ends.
The fact that this is one of Lu Han’s favourite dramas and the dvd box was a gift for their third anniversary is carved in giant, fat capital letters in his mind, but this is his only known recipe for grey days and he doesn’t know what else he can do to chase the shade of sadness away from his heart.
Minseok’s doorbell rings, interrupting the fourth episode right during the climax with a rusty, dull sound. Minseok’s good intentions, his plan of getting up, throwing the empty ice cream bucket away and at least washing his face so that Jongdae doesn’t end up pitying him more than he already does, have been forgotten more or less at the same moment they were professed. Unfortunately it’s too late now, and he rushes towards the bathroom to check his tired face in the middle, taking in the terrifying image of his blotchy eyes and matted hair. The doorbell rings again, and Minseok curses loudly, “Fuck Jongdae, can’t you wait a fucking moment?”
He’s still in the middle of combing his hair with nervous fingers when he finally opens the door, not even bothering to look in the peephole.
“What the hell, Jongdae, what was so urgent that you had to come here and ring the damn bell like-” He freezes, the words dying in his throat. He recognizes the soft, fascinating lines of Lu Han face even under the mask and sunglasses, though he can’t make out his expression.
His first instinct is to slam the door in his face and hide, but Lu Han is quicker, sneaking his foot in the doorway and yelping when it gets stuck in the door, keeping it open. Minseok pulls harder, but Lu Han is already halfway inside and forcing himself onto the door with his entire weight until he finally tumbles on the floor of the flat dragging Minseok down with him, while the door snaps closed.
Familiar Korean voices are still filling the apartment, the dvd rolling in the living room, and Minseok breathes in the even more familiar cologne he himself has gifted Lu Han last Christmas.
“Hey,” is Lu Han’s only greeting, half-murmured, half-sighed against the column of Minseok’s neck, and it isn’t fair the way even that single word make him shiver, like his body has been missing the comfort and the weight of Lu Han’s love and it’s now craving it. Minseok tries to snap out of his Lu Han induced gaze, managing to spit a meek, “I didn’t say you could enter.”
“Yeah, you’re angry, I got it. You know, the week you spent ignoring my calls kinda sold you away.”
“Please go away,” it’s Minseok answer, but at the same time the hands that should’ve pushed Lu Han tangle in his hair and drag him closer. “Please, let me explain,” is what Lu Han says instead.
The kettle whistles and neither Lu Han, nor Minseok, have talked yet. The latter is grumpily eyeing his collection of precious, expensive tea like it’s its fault that Lu Han is still there and not in hell where he belongs, while the former is hesitantly looking at the apartment for the first time, taking in the little pieces of Asia that Minseok has strategically placed inside the house to make it more personal, to bring a little home in his grey Manchester house. It’s a pity that he didn’t come here before the breakup, he would’ve seen our together photos hanging from every wall, thinks Minseok, still referring to the awful incident as a breakup even though they haven’t broken up officially, yet, adds his venomous mind. Maybe it’s a good thing that Lu Han is here. Minseok can finally lift this weight from his shoulders.
“Nice place,” is what Lu Han settles for in the end, immediately finding his chair and gesturing for Minseok to sit as well. Minseok serves the tea, but doesn’t sit. He prefers to stand, the higher position giving him some sort of psychological advantage over Lu Han.
He still doesn’t talk, leaving to Lu Han the burden to start their conversation. It’s the least he can do, after having barged in Minseok’s lair of peace like this. He feels Lu Han’s worried stare on the back of his neck while he opens the drawer to take a box of biscuits. He knows he looks like a mess, but Lu Han isn’t coping any better, he reasons in triumph, gaze slowly sliding over his tired face and distinctly visible eye bags.
Lu Han waits too long to break the silence, not speaking until Minseok’s eyes flutter shut behind the mug to drink his last sip of tea. “I didn’t cheat on you,” is what he says. Not I’m sorry or, It was a mistake, like Minseok was expecting. He thinks he deserves at least a Please forgive me.
But Lu Han is there, looking perfectly distressed and wronged, the image of innocence against the firm and cold set of Minseok’s lips. He almost feel like the one at fault, and it isn’t fair that everyone is behaving like Minseok is the bad one and Lu Han a poor victim of the circumstances.
He can barely keep the contempt out of his voice. “You didn’t?”
“Minseok,” and Lu Han now is pleading, soft and convincing, “you can’t jump to conclusions like that without even hearing my version, you know that I love you and I’d never cheat on you. Why would I need to go with some other girl when you’ve always been everything I’ve ever wanted?”
He almost expected his voice to sound more petulant and whiny, and now he’d give anything to find a single fault in Lu Han’s behaviour, the tiniest, microscopic hint that the other boy is hiding something from him, that he’s feeling guilty. Unfortunately, his voice doesn’t waver, his eyes are calm and hard, filled with the brim with sincerity, and Minseok knows him, has known him long enough to read Lu Han’s lies in the lines of his face. Still, he refuses to believe him. He wants to, he knows he have to, but there’s no way that anyone would choose Kim Minseok over Julia B, and Lu Han isn’t any different. He must be lying.
His eyes travel around the room in search of an argument he can use against Lu Han’s sincerity.
“You’re still not giving me any explanation,” he replies, taking one of the magazines he’s bought in the last few days and throwing it at Lu Han’s face, “you were fucking kissing her, Han!”
He forces his eyes to stay dry, but the very first tear makes its way out of his right eye, rolling delicately against his cheek, and he can’t stop the following either.
Lu Han gets up and tries to caress his face, but Minseok edges away and in the end he can only give him a tissue to wipe his face, as he waits for the Korean boy to calm down.
“Minseok,” he says with a pained voice, putting is hand on Minseok’s shoulder and forcing his head up to look in his eyes, “I have an explanation, but it’s no use saying it if you don’t trust me from the beginning. What happened to us? I always put you first, before anyone else. You have no reason to doubt my real feelings. There’s nothing between me and her and I didn’t kiss her.”
He opens his mouth to protest as vehemently as he can, but Lu Han shuts him up with a finger on his mouth. “I wasn’t kissing her, believe me, I was merely just talking with her. Look,” he says’, pointing to the grainy black and white photos, “look at this! The angle is all wrong, you know that’s not the way I kiss.”
Minseok feels compelled to look at the photo. It’s something he loathes to do, and even when the article came up he didn’t spared it more than a quick look because it was simply too painful for him. Now, as his eyes follow the movement of Lu Han’s fingers along the lines of the two people in the photo, he realizes that something is indeed quite wrong. The photo has probably been mirrored, and the angle of Lu Han’s body is quite strange to look at. Lu Han’s right hand snatches his own, while the other creeps higher to cup his neck.
“You know me thoroughly, Minseok, and you know that if I really had wanted to kiss her I wouldn’t have done it like this. I would’ve put my hand here,” he says, splaying his fingers on Minseok’s nape, “and the other one here,” he says, tickling his throat and lifting his head higher until he's speaking on Minseok's lips. “And then I would’ve tilted my head like this, with my eyes shut, because I already know your face better than anything else but it’s still incredibly distracting and I wouldn’t be able to kiss you properly if I were lost in your eyes.”
Minseok feels himself hyperventilating, failing to grasp how Lu Han could have travelled so fast around the table. A moment ago, he was showing Minseok the photo, and now he feels the hard edge of the table behind him, and even harder edge of Lu Han’s body, chiselled by years of training, pinning him down, their mouths mere centimetres apart. Lu Han scatters his will to resist away with little effort, stripping Minseok of his insecurities and doubts, and then leaves him hanging.
Minseok is still waiting for their lips to press together, for the taste of Lu Han's tongue in his own, when Lu Han steps away. “I can’t do this,” he says, looking unsure. “I called and called, but you thought… and you didn’t even ask me but you started avoiding me. I thought we had something special, but to think that you’d thrown away everything without even giving me a chance to explain… I can’t do this, Minseok.”
Minseok wants to stop him, wants to make hot chocolate and sit on the couch and tell Lu Han everything. How he thinks he’s not enough, how he thinks Lu Han deserves better, how there are girls and boys more beautiful, smarter, more fit to be seen in Lu Han’s company than he is.
He follows Lu Han at the door, but he doesn’t say anything and it’s Lu Han who talks, in the end. “I think we should take a break,” he says, “just a couple of days. No, no, no, no. Don’t look at me like that, dearie, I’m not dumping you, but I think you need to reflect and think about us, and I need it too.”
Minseok doesn’t realize he’s crying, again. Maybe he’s never stopped since that weak, traitorous first tear in the kitchen. “Wait!” he manages to choke out, just as Lu Han’s hand grazes the door handle, “Please, I believe you. Just… stay a little more.”
Second Half＞＞
A/N at the end of part 2 ♥