Super Junior {Hankyung/Heechul ; Run (6/13)}
Title: Run (6/13)
Fandom: Super Junior (AU)
Pairing: Hankyung/Heechul
Word count: 3,434
Rating: R (for violence and mature themes)
Summary: Hankyung and Heechul have been living together for four years now, and their relationship seems pretty much perfect. However, Hankyung has more skeletons in his closet than he has let on, and now his past is about to rear its ugly head in the worst way possible. The thing about lies is that they're remarkably difficult to ignore.
A/N: There are a couple of scenes that I really like in this chapter, but that's probably just me being a soppy moron. Well, it is Valentine's Day, after all XD also, happy birthday to darleenk! I haven't been able to write you birthday fic, so I hope this chapter makes up for that :D
Run (6/13)
HIGHWAY TO HELL - AC/DC
Heechul's car was exactly where they had left it, on the left hand side of the supermarket car park, kind of sloppily parked. "We'll have to be quick," Hankyung said as he pulled slowly into the car park. "I don't think they'll be watching the car, but if they are, we'll soon know about it."
"If they attack us, we take your car?" Heechul confirmed.
"If they know your car, it'll be too obvious. Mine will blend in more."
"Right."
"When I pull up beside it, jump out and get into the passenger side as quickly as you possibly can."
"It's my car. I should get to drive."
Hankyung's knuckles were practically white where he was gripping the steering wheel. "I don't know where we're going," he said through gritted teeth. "I'll drive today just so we can get as far from Seoul as we can, and once we have a more coherent plan, you can drive."
"Fine," Heechul said, accepting easily. It was so easy that Hankyung felt close to breaking point. Instead of breaking, though, he swung the car into the space next to Heechul's car. Heechul, true to word, opened the door, clambered out, quickly unlocked his own car, dived in, and then sat there, blinking. Slowly, Hankyung got out of his car. There was no one watching, just a couple of shoppers looking curiously at Heechul. Hankyung, looking mournfully at his car -- he'd almost wanted there to be a confrontation so he could keep the CD player -- came around to the driver's seat of Heechul's car and got in, a lot more slowly and graceful than Heechul.
"Well, that looked stupid," Heechul said, glaring at him.
"Hey," Hankyung said, taking the car keys from him and turning the engine on. "At least you would have been safe."
They left Seoul just after two o'clock -- the lunch rush was over, and it was a while until the rush of people picking up their children from school began. They managed to leave the city a lot faster than they had the previous day, even with Hankyung driving a little less like a deranged idiot. Once they'd left the city and were on the motorway south, Heechul slipped his shoes off and began fiddling with the radio.
"That's pointless," Hankyung said. "You can never get any signal on that thing."
"Aw, you sound so disgruntled," Heechul said, grinning with him. "No, you can get signal, it's just that it chooses whichever stations it feels like. Last time I visited my parents in this car, I had heavy metal rock all the way down, it was awesome."
"It does not," Hankyung said firmly, "sound awesome."
"I'm sorry," Heechul said sarcastically. "I don't think I can get any classical music on this thing, you'll have to bear with me."
"I don't only listen to classical music," Hankyung protested. "I listen to pop music and I've even given some of your stuff a go, though forgive me if I don't listen to music to be bummed out."
"Hankyung," Heechul said patiently, as he intently messed on with the radio. "You have six CDs in your CD player in your car. Four of them are classical scores. Another is Fahrenheit, because you think the youngest one is cute. The last one is Wonder Girls, and I know it is because I put it there."
"Is that what that was? I seriously just did not have a clue, I thought it was Bach or something."
"No, I burnt Bach."
"You didn't."
"I did. Remember when you came home and said that I smelt nice? That was the fumes of classical music CD."
"You're a bastard."
"You're a guy on the run from the Chinese mafia," Heechul said. "I guess we can't all be perfect."
Hankyung groaned, flicking a glance at him then turning his vision back to the road. "You're never going to let this go, are you? I'm sorry, okay?"
"Oh, Hankyung," Heechul said fondly. "Of course I'm never letting it go. It makes you go all guilty, it is the most adorable thing in the whole world. Aha!" He leaned back in his seat as the radio crackled into life -- and then began spewing out trot music.
"No," Hankyung said in horror, blindly banging a hand against the machine as his eyes were focused on the road. "No, no, I refuse to listen to this--"
"Hey!" Heechul shouted, slapping his hand away. "Careful, you'll break it."
"I won't break it," Hankyung said shrilly. "This car refuses to die, don't you see?"
"It's only trot music," Heechul said, irritated.
"Music," insisted Hankyung, "of the devil."
"So unrefined," Heechul said with a dramatic sigh, and then began singing along to whatever woman was warbling in whatever terrible song the station was playing. Hankyung gritted his teeth and bore it as best he could until they were thirty miles down the line and the station suddenly lost signal. Heechul was cut off in the middle of Let's Go, and blinked at the radio. "That's just rude," he told it.
"Find something better," Hankyung told him.
It took Heechul another ten minutes of minutely moving the dial up before he managed to get another station to work. Somehow, Heechul's pathetic radio in his vintage car was managing to pick up an American country and western station. "That's so cool!" Heechul said in an almost squeal, before admitting that he hated country and western. Hankyung did too. They stared at each other.
"I hate being in cars with no music," Heechul said stubbornly. Hankyung sighed.
"Fine," he said. "But if they play Achy Breaky Heart, I am turning that off."
"They won't play Achy Breaky Heart," Heechul said scornfully, just as the opening twangs on the guitar started up. Heechul stopped Hankyung's flailing hand by pinching the back of it.
They drove for another three hours before Hankyung decided he needed a break from Billy Ray Cyrus, and Heechul was complaining about needing to go to the toilet. Hankyung pulled into the nearest service and cut the engine. "I hope it works when I turn it on again," he said. "It's been a while since it drove so far."
"It'll be fine," Heechul said, unbuckling his seat belt. "It's not pathetic and weak like your car."
"My car took us all the way to see your parents last time," Hankyung said, "because yours had failed its MOT."
Heechul faltered a little. "Yeah, well," he said, a little sadly and not like he meant anything by it at all. "It isn't taking me to my parent's house this time."
"Oh." Hankyung reached out to take Heechul's hand. "Oh, Heechul, I didn't--"
"It's fine," Heechul said, waving him off, looking annoyed at the comforting. "I know you didn't. I want chocolate. What do you want?"
"Get me a sandwich. Anything will do."
"Anything without tomatoes, got it." Heechul got out of the car, grumbling about how hungry he was. Hankyung waited until he had safely gone into the shop before getting out of his own side and beginning to fill the car up with petrol. He get one careful eye on what was going on in the store, though mainly it was just Heechul wandering up and down the aisles, staring at everything in his usual indecisive manner. The girl behind the counter wasn't even watching him, she was flicking through a copy of some fashion magazine. The other guy in there was waiting for the coffee machine to hand him his caffeine in a cup.
A car pulled up to the petrol fill up next to where Hankyung had parked Heechul's car, and a man got out, looking appreciatively at the Impala. "Nice car," he said. "Impala, right? Which year?"
"Sixty-seven," Hankyung said, like he knew what he was talking about.
"Nice," said the man. "I always wanted one of them." Hankyung really couldn't understand why.
"Oh, it's not mine," he said, smiling. "I'm just driving it for my partner."
"Drive well?"
"Um." Hankyung really didn't understand these conversations about cars, but at least this was a question that he could answer. "Not really, no."
"Shut up," Heechul said, who had appeared at his side suddenly holding a plastic bag full of food, the majority of it of the sweet variety. "It drives like a dream. Smooth. Like the American dream."
"Oh, so it's yours?" Heechul nodded. "I was just saying, it's a beautiful car."
"It is," Heechul said, patting the hood. "It's my baby."
Hankyung kind of wanted to ask, "What about me?" but decided against it. Instead, he waited patiently for the petrol to fill up while Heechul and the stranger talked about how wonderful the car was. Hankyung noticed that Heechul failed to mention anything about the country and western station; Hankyung was singing Achy Breaky Heart in his head.
Movement out of the corner of his eye drew his attention to the car just pulling into the service station. It was black, with tinted windows, almost exactly like the one that had been hanging around outside their house for the past week. Hankyung turned his face to the side as it drove past where the car was and along to a fill up point further down. There a man jumped out and began to fill up, dressed in a black suit, sunglasses on his face. Another men, dressed much the same, got out of the back and walked into the store.
Hankyung figured that they had a matter of minutes before the guy in the store walked out and got a good glance at his face. He couldn't be sure that they were the guys after them, but from what he remembered, they certainly looked the part. "Heechul," he said tensely. "I think we'd better be leaving now."
"But I'm--"
"Heechul."
Heechul went still and nodded stiffly, understanding that he wasn't being rushed for no good reason. The man he had been talking to looked at him, then looked at Hankyung's closed off expression, and frowned. Great, thought Hankyung. He probably thinks I'm some sort of spouse beater or something. He didn't have time to think about that, though. Heechul quickly, but pleasantly, said goodbye to the man, and got into the passenger side of the car, casually putting the bag of food on his knee so that it looked perfectly normal. "Hey," Hankyung said, digging in his pocket and bringing out a number of notes. "Will you pay for my petrol with this? Keep the change."
"What--?"
"Please," Hankyung said desperately. "Please, just do it for me?"
The man nodded slowly. Hankyung nodded back, then got back into the car as quickly as he possibly could. The man watched them dumbly as Hankyung threw the car into gear and then, slightly anti-climatically, drove slowly and carefully out of the station -- he didn't want to draw any more attention to them. Once out on the motorway again, he drove faster, and Heechul finally asked what he'd been wondering since he'd first been told to get in the car.
"See someone you knew?"
"Not quite," Hankyung said with a weak smile. "They just looked like the kind of people I should know." Heechul was silent, but Hankyung thought he knew what he was thinking. "You think I overreacted, don't you?"
There was a pause. "No," Heechul said, surprising Hankyung a little. "To be honest, Hankyung, I don't really -- I mean, it was only this time yesterday, give or take a few hours, that you turned my entire world upside down, how am I supposed to know if you're overreacting or not?"
"I did overreact," Hankyung said. "I know I did, but I want to -- I need to overreact, because one wrong move could mean the difference between -- both of us waking up together, or one of us laying in a bed with an empty, cold side for the rest of our lives."
"I'd buy a single," Heechul said. "Then I'd get all your clothes and dump them on top of me and use them as covers and it'll be just like the next best thing."
"So you'd get on just fine without me?"
"Heck no," Heechul said. "What are you, high? I said it would be like the next best thing."
"Oh," Hankyung said, smiling.
"Creeper face alert," Heechul said, and mushed some of his toffee muffin into the side of Hankyung's face.
They stopped for the night in a hotel in a small town six hours south of Seoul. Hankyung had initially wanted to keep going, but Heechul had seen how tired he was getting and bitched until he'd stopped -- the late night, early morning, and day driving had taken their toll. The only hotel they could find that had a room free was one that looked decidedly seedy, but at least had clean sheets on the bed. "Remember," Heechul said, as he sat down on the bed, "when we were watching Gossip Girl and you said that you'd take me to New York City one day and we'd stay at The Plaza and you'd pay for everything? Yeah."
"Oh, shut up," Hankyung said, fiddling with the tea pot. There wasn't even a fridge. Just a tea pot and a kettle and some biscuits and sachets off coffee, tea and sugar. Tiny plastic tubs of milk. He sighed and fell face first onto the bed
"If you expect me to put out in a place like this," Heechul said from above him, "then you've got another thing coming."
"Mrgh," mumbled Hankyung into the bed.
"I'm hungry," Heechul said. "What are we doing for dinner?"
Hankyung lifted his head long enough to say, "We'll order in," before he dropped it again and snaked a hand around Heechul's waist and pulled him down next to him. "I'm sorry," he said into his shoulder.
"Some day I'll forgive you," Heechul said. He was only half-joking, and Hankyung knew it. He tightened his hand on his hip.
"You know I would never, never hurt you," he said. "Never. I never wanted to hurt you. You should know that of me, at least."
"I don't know what to think anymore, Hankyung," Heechul said, head turned so that his lips brushed against Hankyung's hair as he spoke. "In the space of twenty four hours, you just completely destroyed everything I thought I knew about you. I just--"
"Not everything," Hankyung interrupted. "I still hate tomatoes." Heechul huffed out a laugh, making his hair ruffle. "I still like warm weather and documentaries on Chinese stuff and Saturday mornings spent in bed." He shifted so he could kiss Heechul softly on the mouth. "I still love you."
"But you aren't an accountant anymore," Heechul said. "You're an ex-dance student with a killer on your heels. That's kind of a big thing to suddenly bring into a relationship."
"I know it is," Hankyung said, dropping his head to his shoulder. "I know it is, and I never thought -- I didn't want this. I just wanted it to be me, and you, and one of those kids from the envelope that we never even got to open. I wanted it to be that forever."
"The only thing keeping me here is the knowledge that you'll probably die without me." Heechul struggled upright. "That and the fact that I'm like, ridiculously in love with you, though god only knows why."
"I'm in love with you because you bully me," grumbled Hankyung into the bed.
When Hankyung woke up the next morning, he had a plan of action semi-thought out. "We'll keep heading south," he said over breakfast at a tiny cafe down the street from their hotel. "Make it as much of a zig-zag journey as possible, avoiding the motorways if we can, since they'll expect us to take them. We'll make sure that they don't manage to pick up a trail, and hopefully we'll be able to set up somewhere for a short while."
"Whatever," Heechul said, listlessly poking his fork into his omelette. "I just want some decent food for once."
"We'll stop somewhere with a mini-kitchen tonight," Hankyung promised. "I'll make something."
"Where are we going?" Heechul asked. Hankyung shrugged. "So you're driving again?"
"If you don't mind."
"No, it's fine. Shot gun gets control of the radio -- oh, wait."
By midday, they were out of the town and on their way further south, taking smaller roads but not venturing into the countryside. Heechul didn't dare touch the radio for fear that he lose even the country and western station, but after an hour in which Hankyung heard Achy Breaky Heart twice, he ground out, "Heechul, find something else or I will rip that radio from the dashboard with my teeth."
"Why do you have to break my heart?" Heechul asked. "My achy breaky heart?"
"Even the trot was better than this," Hankyung decided. "I seriously cannot take this anymore, Heechul."
"We have to go shopping," Heechul said. He didn't turn the country and western music off, but he did at least turn it down so that it was barely audible anyway. "I've been thinking and we can't keep wearing these clothes. It's beginning to show that we've been wearing them for three days. Your suit was not built for such abuse."
"We can't afford to spend too much money, Heechul."
"Hey, remember, I managed to remain stylish all the way through university just from charity shops. I can do this."
Do this, he could, as he proved when they stopped off at a fairly large town somewhere north of Jeonju, and he attacked the charity shops with a lot more zeal than Hankyung had ever seen him go for the designer stores with. Perhaps having a serious purpose for shopping gave him a reason to be so intense; maybe he just secretly liked charity shops more but didn't think that he had any excuses for going in now he was no longer strapped for cash as a university student. Hankyung stood, amazed, as Heechul picked out a couple of decent outfits from what looked to Hankyung like a shop full of stuff.
"How did you do that?" Hankyung asked in an awestruck voice as Heechul pranced out of the place looking so smug Hankyung was surprised people didn't just randomly punch him.
"It's not something you learn," Heechul said, dumping the backs in the boot of the car. "It's something that you're born with."
"Meanwhile, arrogance is something that you learn." Hankyung ducked as Heechul tried to flick his forehead. He jumped into the front seat of the car and waited as Heechul got into his own seat. "We have clothes. Anything else we need?"
"Well, you could probably do with a mobile phone."
"No," Hankyung said quickly. "I think you should get rid of yours too, they might be able to track us through it."
"But I haven't even turned it on since we left Seoul. I was going to keep it just for emergencies."
"Well, if that's all you use it for, I suppose it's okay."
"I've probably got a thousand messages from people wondering where I am," Heechul said, looking thoughtfully at the blank screen. "Is it Wednesday today? I was supposed to meet Mi-goo to hand in the first draft of my chapters today. She'll realise something isn't right."
"She'll already know," Hankyung said, and then added, when Heechul looked at him curiously, "I mean, if he did what we was threatening to do and burnt the house down."
"You really think he'll have done it?"
"I don't know. I do know that he probably thinks you're dead, he said -- something about locking you inside the house. You have no idea how scared I was when I called you to find out where you were. He probably doesn't expect me to go to far from your -- body. Once he realises that the police found no bodies in the house, though, he'll start moving."
"So we're getting as far south as we possibly can before he realises?"
"Exactly."
As they entered the residential areas of the town, Heechul slipped his shoes off and pulled his feet up onto his seat, curling over them. "I hope they don't tell my parents that I'm missing," he said, voice muffled against his knee. Hankyung didn't move or look at him as he continued driving. It was going to take a lot to make it better, and he wasn't sure how he could.
Fandom: Super Junior (AU)
Pairing: Hankyung/Heechul
Word count: 3,434
Rating: R (for violence and mature themes)
Summary: Hankyung and Heechul have been living together for four years now, and their relationship seems pretty much perfect. However, Hankyung has more skeletons in his closet than he has let on, and now his past is about to rear its ugly head in the worst way possible. The thing about lies is that they're remarkably difficult to ignore.
A/N: There are a couple of scenes that I really like in this chapter, but that's probably just me being a soppy moron. Well, it is Valentine's Day, after all XD also, happy birthday to darleenk! I haven't been able to write you birthday fic, so I hope this chapter makes up for that :D
Run (6/13)
HIGHWAY TO HELL - AC/DC
Heechul's car was exactly where they had left it, on the left hand side of the supermarket car park, kind of sloppily parked. "We'll have to be quick," Hankyung said as he pulled slowly into the car park. "I don't think they'll be watching the car, but if they are, we'll soon know about it."
"If they attack us, we take your car?" Heechul confirmed.
"If they know your car, it'll be too obvious. Mine will blend in more."
"Right."
"When I pull up beside it, jump out and get into the passenger side as quickly as you possibly can."
"It's my car. I should get to drive."
Hankyung's knuckles were practically white where he was gripping the steering wheel. "I don't know where we're going," he said through gritted teeth. "I'll drive today just so we can get as far from Seoul as we can, and once we have a more coherent plan, you can drive."
"Fine," Heechul said, accepting easily. It was so easy that Hankyung felt close to breaking point. Instead of breaking, though, he swung the car into the space next to Heechul's car. Heechul, true to word, opened the door, clambered out, quickly unlocked his own car, dived in, and then sat there, blinking. Slowly, Hankyung got out of his car. There was no one watching, just a couple of shoppers looking curiously at Heechul. Hankyung, looking mournfully at his car -- he'd almost wanted there to be a confrontation so he could keep the CD player -- came around to the driver's seat of Heechul's car and got in, a lot more slowly and graceful than Heechul.
"Well, that looked stupid," Heechul said, glaring at him.
"Hey," Hankyung said, taking the car keys from him and turning the engine on. "At least you would have been safe."
They left Seoul just after two o'clock -- the lunch rush was over, and it was a while until the rush of people picking up their children from school began. They managed to leave the city a lot faster than they had the previous day, even with Hankyung driving a little less like a deranged idiot. Once they'd left the city and were on the motorway south, Heechul slipped his shoes off and began fiddling with the radio.
"That's pointless," Hankyung said. "You can never get any signal on that thing."
"Aw, you sound so disgruntled," Heechul said, grinning with him. "No, you can get signal, it's just that it chooses whichever stations it feels like. Last time I visited my parents in this car, I had heavy metal rock all the way down, it was awesome."
"It does not," Hankyung said firmly, "sound awesome."
"I'm sorry," Heechul said sarcastically. "I don't think I can get any classical music on this thing, you'll have to bear with me."
"I don't only listen to classical music," Hankyung protested. "I listen to pop music and I've even given some of your stuff a go, though forgive me if I don't listen to music to be bummed out."
"Hankyung," Heechul said patiently, as he intently messed on with the radio. "You have six CDs in your CD player in your car. Four of them are classical scores. Another is Fahrenheit, because you think the youngest one is cute. The last one is Wonder Girls, and I know it is because I put it there."
"Is that what that was? I seriously just did not have a clue, I thought it was Bach or something."
"No, I burnt Bach."
"You didn't."
"I did. Remember when you came home and said that I smelt nice? That was the fumes of classical music CD."
"You're a bastard."
"You're a guy on the run from the Chinese mafia," Heechul said. "I guess we can't all be perfect."
Hankyung groaned, flicking a glance at him then turning his vision back to the road. "You're never going to let this go, are you? I'm sorry, okay?"
"Oh, Hankyung," Heechul said fondly. "Of course I'm never letting it go. It makes you go all guilty, it is the most adorable thing in the whole world. Aha!" He leaned back in his seat as the radio crackled into life -- and then began spewing out trot music.
"No," Hankyung said in horror, blindly banging a hand against the machine as his eyes were focused on the road. "No, no, I refuse to listen to this--"
"Hey!" Heechul shouted, slapping his hand away. "Careful, you'll break it."
"I won't break it," Hankyung said shrilly. "This car refuses to die, don't you see?"
"It's only trot music," Heechul said, irritated.
"Music," insisted Hankyung, "of the devil."
"So unrefined," Heechul said with a dramatic sigh, and then began singing along to whatever woman was warbling in whatever terrible song the station was playing. Hankyung gritted his teeth and bore it as best he could until they were thirty miles down the line and the station suddenly lost signal. Heechul was cut off in the middle of Let's Go, and blinked at the radio. "That's just rude," he told it.
"Find something better," Hankyung told him.
It took Heechul another ten minutes of minutely moving the dial up before he managed to get another station to work. Somehow, Heechul's pathetic radio in his vintage car was managing to pick up an American country and western station. "That's so cool!" Heechul said in an almost squeal, before admitting that he hated country and western. Hankyung did too. They stared at each other.
"I hate being in cars with no music," Heechul said stubbornly. Hankyung sighed.
"Fine," he said. "But if they play Achy Breaky Heart, I am turning that off."
"They won't play Achy Breaky Heart," Heechul said scornfully, just as the opening twangs on the guitar started up. Heechul stopped Hankyung's flailing hand by pinching the back of it.
They drove for another three hours before Hankyung decided he needed a break from Billy Ray Cyrus, and Heechul was complaining about needing to go to the toilet. Hankyung pulled into the nearest service and cut the engine. "I hope it works when I turn it on again," he said. "It's been a while since it drove so far."
"It'll be fine," Heechul said, unbuckling his seat belt. "It's not pathetic and weak like your car."
"My car took us all the way to see your parents last time," Hankyung said, "because yours had failed its MOT."
Heechul faltered a little. "Yeah, well," he said, a little sadly and not like he meant anything by it at all. "It isn't taking me to my parent's house this time."
"Oh." Hankyung reached out to take Heechul's hand. "Oh, Heechul, I didn't--"
"It's fine," Heechul said, waving him off, looking annoyed at the comforting. "I know you didn't. I want chocolate. What do you want?"
"Get me a sandwich. Anything will do."
"Anything without tomatoes, got it." Heechul got out of the car, grumbling about how hungry he was. Hankyung waited until he had safely gone into the shop before getting out of his own side and beginning to fill the car up with petrol. He get one careful eye on what was going on in the store, though mainly it was just Heechul wandering up and down the aisles, staring at everything in his usual indecisive manner. The girl behind the counter wasn't even watching him, she was flicking through a copy of some fashion magazine. The other guy in there was waiting for the coffee machine to hand him his caffeine in a cup.
A car pulled up to the petrol fill up next to where Hankyung had parked Heechul's car, and a man got out, looking appreciatively at the Impala. "Nice car," he said. "Impala, right? Which year?"
"Sixty-seven," Hankyung said, like he knew what he was talking about.
"Nice," said the man. "I always wanted one of them." Hankyung really couldn't understand why.
"Oh, it's not mine," he said, smiling. "I'm just driving it for my partner."
"Drive well?"
"Um." Hankyung really didn't understand these conversations about cars, but at least this was a question that he could answer. "Not really, no."
"Shut up," Heechul said, who had appeared at his side suddenly holding a plastic bag full of food, the majority of it of the sweet variety. "It drives like a dream. Smooth. Like the American dream."
"Oh, so it's yours?" Heechul nodded. "I was just saying, it's a beautiful car."
"It is," Heechul said, patting the hood. "It's my baby."
Hankyung kind of wanted to ask, "What about me?" but decided against it. Instead, he waited patiently for the petrol to fill up while Heechul and the stranger talked about how wonderful the car was. Hankyung noticed that Heechul failed to mention anything about the country and western station; Hankyung was singing Achy Breaky Heart in his head.
Movement out of the corner of his eye drew his attention to the car just pulling into the service station. It was black, with tinted windows, almost exactly like the one that had been hanging around outside their house for the past week. Hankyung turned his face to the side as it drove past where the car was and along to a fill up point further down. There a man jumped out and began to fill up, dressed in a black suit, sunglasses on his face. Another men, dressed much the same, got out of the back and walked into the store.
Hankyung figured that they had a matter of minutes before the guy in the store walked out and got a good glance at his face. He couldn't be sure that they were the guys after them, but from what he remembered, they certainly looked the part. "Heechul," he said tensely. "I think we'd better be leaving now."
"But I'm--"
"Heechul."
Heechul went still and nodded stiffly, understanding that he wasn't being rushed for no good reason. The man he had been talking to looked at him, then looked at Hankyung's closed off expression, and frowned. Great, thought Hankyung. He probably thinks I'm some sort of spouse beater or something. He didn't have time to think about that, though. Heechul quickly, but pleasantly, said goodbye to the man, and got into the passenger side of the car, casually putting the bag of food on his knee so that it looked perfectly normal. "Hey," Hankyung said, digging in his pocket and bringing out a number of notes. "Will you pay for my petrol with this? Keep the change."
"What--?"
"Please," Hankyung said desperately. "Please, just do it for me?"
The man nodded slowly. Hankyung nodded back, then got back into the car as quickly as he possibly could. The man watched them dumbly as Hankyung threw the car into gear and then, slightly anti-climatically, drove slowly and carefully out of the station -- he didn't want to draw any more attention to them. Once out on the motorway again, he drove faster, and Heechul finally asked what he'd been wondering since he'd first been told to get in the car.
"See someone you knew?"
"Not quite," Hankyung said with a weak smile. "They just looked like the kind of people I should know." Heechul was silent, but Hankyung thought he knew what he was thinking. "You think I overreacted, don't you?"
There was a pause. "No," Heechul said, surprising Hankyung a little. "To be honest, Hankyung, I don't really -- I mean, it was only this time yesterday, give or take a few hours, that you turned my entire world upside down, how am I supposed to know if you're overreacting or not?"
"I did overreact," Hankyung said. "I know I did, but I want to -- I need to overreact, because one wrong move could mean the difference between -- both of us waking up together, or one of us laying in a bed with an empty, cold side for the rest of our lives."
"I'd buy a single," Heechul said. "Then I'd get all your clothes and dump them on top of me and use them as covers and it'll be just like the next best thing."
"So you'd get on just fine without me?"
"Heck no," Heechul said. "What are you, high? I said it would be like the next best thing."
"Oh," Hankyung said, smiling.
"Creeper face alert," Heechul said, and mushed some of his toffee muffin into the side of Hankyung's face.
They stopped for the night in a hotel in a small town six hours south of Seoul. Hankyung had initially wanted to keep going, but Heechul had seen how tired he was getting and bitched until he'd stopped -- the late night, early morning, and day driving had taken their toll. The only hotel they could find that had a room free was one that looked decidedly seedy, but at least had clean sheets on the bed. "Remember," Heechul said, as he sat down on the bed, "when we were watching Gossip Girl and you said that you'd take me to New York City one day and we'd stay at The Plaza and you'd pay for everything? Yeah."
"Oh, shut up," Hankyung said, fiddling with the tea pot. There wasn't even a fridge. Just a tea pot and a kettle and some biscuits and sachets off coffee, tea and sugar. Tiny plastic tubs of milk. He sighed and fell face first onto the bed
"If you expect me to put out in a place like this," Heechul said from above him, "then you've got another thing coming."
"Mrgh," mumbled Hankyung into the bed.
"I'm hungry," Heechul said. "What are we doing for dinner?"
Hankyung lifted his head long enough to say, "We'll order in," before he dropped it again and snaked a hand around Heechul's waist and pulled him down next to him. "I'm sorry," he said into his shoulder.
"Some day I'll forgive you," Heechul said. He was only half-joking, and Hankyung knew it. He tightened his hand on his hip.
"You know I would never, never hurt you," he said. "Never. I never wanted to hurt you. You should know that of me, at least."
"I don't know what to think anymore, Hankyung," Heechul said, head turned so that his lips brushed against Hankyung's hair as he spoke. "In the space of twenty four hours, you just completely destroyed everything I thought I knew about you. I just--"
"Not everything," Hankyung interrupted. "I still hate tomatoes." Heechul huffed out a laugh, making his hair ruffle. "I still like warm weather and documentaries on Chinese stuff and Saturday mornings spent in bed." He shifted so he could kiss Heechul softly on the mouth. "I still love you."
"But you aren't an accountant anymore," Heechul said. "You're an ex-dance student with a killer on your heels. That's kind of a big thing to suddenly bring into a relationship."
"I know it is," Hankyung said, dropping his head to his shoulder. "I know it is, and I never thought -- I didn't want this. I just wanted it to be me, and you, and one of those kids from the envelope that we never even got to open. I wanted it to be that forever."
"The only thing keeping me here is the knowledge that you'll probably die without me." Heechul struggled upright. "That and the fact that I'm like, ridiculously in love with you, though god only knows why."
"I'm in love with you because you bully me," grumbled Hankyung into the bed.
When Hankyung woke up the next morning, he had a plan of action semi-thought out. "We'll keep heading south," he said over breakfast at a tiny cafe down the street from their hotel. "Make it as much of a zig-zag journey as possible, avoiding the motorways if we can, since they'll expect us to take them. We'll make sure that they don't manage to pick up a trail, and hopefully we'll be able to set up somewhere for a short while."
"Whatever," Heechul said, listlessly poking his fork into his omelette. "I just want some decent food for once."
"We'll stop somewhere with a mini-kitchen tonight," Hankyung promised. "I'll make something."
"Where are we going?" Heechul asked. Hankyung shrugged. "So you're driving again?"
"If you don't mind."
"No, it's fine. Shot gun gets control of the radio -- oh, wait."
By midday, they were out of the town and on their way further south, taking smaller roads but not venturing into the countryside. Heechul didn't dare touch the radio for fear that he lose even the country and western station, but after an hour in which Hankyung heard Achy Breaky Heart twice, he ground out, "Heechul, find something else or I will rip that radio from the dashboard with my teeth."
"Why do you have to break my heart?" Heechul asked. "My achy breaky heart?"
"Even the trot was better than this," Hankyung decided. "I seriously cannot take this anymore, Heechul."
"We have to go shopping," Heechul said. He didn't turn the country and western music off, but he did at least turn it down so that it was barely audible anyway. "I've been thinking and we can't keep wearing these clothes. It's beginning to show that we've been wearing them for three days. Your suit was not built for such abuse."
"We can't afford to spend too much money, Heechul."
"Hey, remember, I managed to remain stylish all the way through university just from charity shops. I can do this."
Do this, he could, as he proved when they stopped off at a fairly large town somewhere north of Jeonju, and he attacked the charity shops with a lot more zeal than Hankyung had ever seen him go for the designer stores with. Perhaps having a serious purpose for shopping gave him a reason to be so intense; maybe he just secretly liked charity shops more but didn't think that he had any excuses for going in now he was no longer strapped for cash as a university student. Hankyung stood, amazed, as Heechul picked out a couple of decent outfits from what looked to Hankyung like a shop full of stuff.
"How did you do that?" Hankyung asked in an awestruck voice as Heechul pranced out of the place looking so smug Hankyung was surprised people didn't just randomly punch him.
"It's not something you learn," Heechul said, dumping the backs in the boot of the car. "It's something that you're born with."
"Meanwhile, arrogance is something that you learn." Hankyung ducked as Heechul tried to flick his forehead. He jumped into the front seat of the car and waited as Heechul got into his own seat. "We have clothes. Anything else we need?"
"Well, you could probably do with a mobile phone."
"No," Hankyung said quickly. "I think you should get rid of yours too, they might be able to track us through it."
"But I haven't even turned it on since we left Seoul. I was going to keep it just for emergencies."
"Well, if that's all you use it for, I suppose it's okay."
"I've probably got a thousand messages from people wondering where I am," Heechul said, looking thoughtfully at the blank screen. "Is it Wednesday today? I was supposed to meet Mi-goo to hand in the first draft of my chapters today. She'll realise something isn't right."
"She'll already know," Hankyung said, and then added, when Heechul looked at him curiously, "I mean, if he did what we was threatening to do and burnt the house down."
"You really think he'll have done it?"
"I don't know. I do know that he probably thinks you're dead, he said -- something about locking you inside the house. You have no idea how scared I was when I called you to find out where you were. He probably doesn't expect me to go to far from your -- body. Once he realises that the police found no bodies in the house, though, he'll start moving."
"So we're getting as far south as we possibly can before he realises?"
"Exactly."
As they entered the residential areas of the town, Heechul slipped his shoes off and pulled his feet up onto his seat, curling over them. "I hope they don't tell my parents that I'm missing," he said, voice muffled against his knee. Hankyung didn't move or look at him as he continued driving. It was going to take a lot to make it better, and he wasn't sure how he could.