falling stars + fake smiles; chapter 12
It was weird that night. Usually, being the nocturnal owl who could lie awake all night and yet still managed to slip in enough peaceful sleep for tomorrow’s hectic schedule, Kyuhyun found himself tossing and turning in his small bed, his stomach feeling like a shaken-up bottle of soda. He rolled around uncomfortably under his blanket for a few stubborn minutes in a vain attempt to ease the woozy sensation, as if the more he moved, the less shaken up he’d feel.
At least when he began to feel dizzy and carsick, Kyuhyun’s eyes snapped open. Surprisingly, it wasn’t total darkness that greeted him. he’d feel less annoyed if it was the light of the sun, but it was obvious that someone had left the light in the corridor on, and his bedroom door was wide open for it to shine into at its fullest.
“Sungmin hyung…” Kyuhyun croaked, letting out a long grown and rubbing his face. “Turn off the light.”
No answer.
“Sungmin hyung?” Rather than sitting up, the Super Junior member stayed lying down and arched up his back up so that his head was upside down to see whether Sungmin was actually there sleeping like a log, hence not answering, or if he just wasn’t there to answer at all.
Nope, he wasn’t there. His bed was even made.
Kyuhyun kicked off his blanket in frustration and let out another groan, getting up from his warm bed. He furrowed his eyebrows at the door and scratched his messy hair.
“Aisshh, just because I’m younger, you don’t even bother closing the door…” he grumbled, making his way over to dutifully close the damn door himself.
He frowned again, a gust of wind suddenly gushing into the room and rustling through his hair. he turned his head to shoot a glance at the window, which he saw was miraculously open, the curtains that were still just a few seconds ago flying in the wind.
“That’s weird…” he mumbled.
Kyuhyun’s feet were still leading him to where the door was, his hand readily extended in order to grab the handle to pull shut the shield against the light… and he would’ve paid more attention to where he was going instead of using up those two seconds being preoccupied with the window. If only he had known (but seriously, how could he have known…) that his hand would never touch the brass door handle and that his next step was onto thin air, plunging him into a hold in the ground that was most likely not meant to be there.
The fall was abrupt and Kyuhyun let out a yelp of surprise, which then proceeded to turn into a scream as the drop became more and more real even though, if he had the time to think at that moment, it just couldn’t be.
All Kyuhyun could see was the black hole he had fallen through grow smaller and smaller as he fell further and further away from it at full speed, until suddenly he stopped in midair and allowed to gently float down instead. Kyuhyun was out of breath and confused, glancing around at his surroundings as his PJs carried him down like a parachute.
This feeling was very similar to a story he read as a child. He looked up again at the top where he fell from, but he was too far down to see the rabbit hole at his point.
“Ah… rabbit hole,” Kyuhyun muttered to himself, finally getting it. He looked around again at the walls around him that were slowly morphing into that of a mining ground, all of the soil in the colour of chocolate. It amused him. “Huh, I guess this is a dream.”
He swung his legs back and forth playfully as his body turned carefully so he had a clear view of the world of his dream. It was definitely his dream, since at the very moment he was just beginning to get bored, gravity returned and dropped him three feet from the ground with a thump.
Since it was his dream, Kyuhyun still managed to land onto his bare feet comfortably. He dusted his clothed and continued to inspect everything around him, glancing up once more to see whether or not the rabbit hole was still there. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted at the top of his voice.
“SUNGMIN HYUNG!!!” he bellowed.
No answer.
“ARE YOU UP THERE?!”
Still no answer.
“Kyuhyun ah,” a familiar female voice suddenly answered back instead, startling Kyuhyun. He looked around wildly to try and find the source of the voice, but it only prompted whoever it was to laugh.
“Behind you.” The Super Junior member turned around, and just like she said, he saw who it was.
“Seungyeon…?” he blurted.
The Kara member was sitting down a few feet away at a table that had magically appeared out of nowhere, and she seemed to have been waiting for him. Kyuhyun didn’t know how to react to this, his eyes were wide and blinking repeatedly, and he couldn’t speak right away. He was surprised to see her… well, he would’ve been more surprised to see her if it were not for the strange outfit she was wearing that immediately caught his eye instead.
It might have been ironic if he didn’t already recognize the rabbit hole trait of his dream, but Seungyeon was wearing a lacy red and black dress with a hoop skirt that fell down to her ankles and covered up every inch of her body except her face, and a huge crown on her head that was too heavy and big for her head.
“What are you doing here?” he said incredulously, not really thinking much at this point.
“You’re still asleep,” Seungyeon told him. “This is all a dream.” Kyuhyun let out a laugh of disbelief.
“Yeah, I've figured out that much,” he said wryly.
He continued to stare at her costume up and down for a few very awkward seconds, and Seungyeon starting to look uncomfortable about it. She cleared her throat, letting out a fake cough into her white-gloved hand. Since he was still standing a reasonable distance away, she put on her bright smile and gestured for him to come closer. He was still suspicious and perhaps even afraid of her extravagant outfit, not budging from his spot.
“Oppa, why are you like this~?’ Seungyeon said in an aegyo voice, a cute frown creasing between her eyebrows. “I go out of my way to be in your dream and you’re not even happy to see me?”
Kyuhyun didn’t shudder this time at her aegyo, which he found strange considering his reaction last time. He screwed up his forehead.
“Did you call me oppa?” he said skeptically, narrowing one eye and tilting his head to the side. Seungyeon smiled coyly, leaning her elbows onto the table.
“You must subconsciously want me to call you oppa,” she teased, giving him a cute wink.
He just kept staring at her with a dubious expression, his head still cocked to the side and not seeming to fully understanding what she just said at all. Seungyeon burst out laughing again. Taking advantage of his blank-out, she clapped her hands and signalled at the chair in front of her, something he failed to notice before.
“Come closer already,” she said sternly, patting the seat with her hand. “Obviously we’ve got to get through something here today. Come on~”
Kyuhyun finally decided to just go ahead and listen to her; it wasn’t like something was going to get him since, after all, it was his dream. He cautiously approached the table, still staring with fascination at Seungyeon’s weird dress and making no effort to hide it.
“What are you wearing?” he asked, pointing at the crown that didn’t seem to fit properly on her head. Seungyeon adjusted it with both hands so that it sat in place before she looked down at her outfit, placing her hands on the narrow waist. “Is that a corset? Who are you supposed to be anyway?” Even Kyuhyun could tell she wasn’t pleased with her outfit either.
“I’m not sure…” she murmured, tugging at one of several fancy buttons down her front. They looked like they were sewn on for decoration and Seungyeon wouldn’t be able to get out of the dress without assistance. Kyuhyun stopped at the table but didn’t sit, towering over the girl in the chair.
“You look like the Queen of Hearts.,” he remarked. He reached over and touched her crown, running his fingers along the big gemstones encrusted in the gold, all of it looking very heavy and not very attractive up close. He wrinkled his nose in distaste, glancing down at Seungyeon. He shook his head. “I expected you to look hotter than this, to be honest.” Seungyeon laughed.
“Just be glad I didn’t end up in a wedding dress or something else perverted,” she joked, hitting his arm playfully. “Just take a seat, please.”
Kyuhyun sighed, suddenly feeling disappointed in himself for his lack of creativity.
“Fine,” he grumbled. Having nothing left to do, he complied with Seungyeon’s request and manoeuvred himself into the chair opposite her from across the small table, sitting down and earning himself a smile from the Kara member. He shuffled inward a little and watched curiously as she shifted to sit up straight on her seat, rubbing her hands together excitedly.
“Okay, so let’s get started,” she said perkily, her smile so big and wide that Kyuhyun couldn’t even see her eyes. She pointed at the middle of the empty table in front of them and Kyuhyun naturally looked at it.
Nothing seemed to happen until Seungyeon picked up a velvet bag from under her chair and stuck her hand into it, pulling out a handful of sparkly dust. Kyuhyun watched blankly as she threw the dust onto the wooden surface of the table, and then with a magical poof and some smoke effects, a chess set appeared, equipped with all the chess pieces being in precise place, ready for a match. Kyuhyun blinked stupidly at this random item before his eyes after such a cheap magic trick, not knowing what to say about it.
“Chess…?” was all he managed to say, utterly confused. He scratched his head, looking over at Seungyeon for help. He glanced at her dress again. “But… why are you the Queen of Hearts if we’re playing chess?”
Seungyeon just shrugged, completely unfazed. She smirked and rested her chin on her fist.
“This is your dream, not mine,” she said lightly. She imitated his habit of narrowing one eye and pointed a finger accusingly at him. “You didn’t drink apple juice before going to sleep again, did you?”
“How did you-“ But Kyuhyun then stopped himself, reminded that this was a dream. He cleared his throat and scratched the back of his neck, embarrassed. “I was thirsty and we were out of milk, so…” He trailed off, at the same time shifting his gaze somewhere else like he did whenever he lied or didn’t want to answer the question.
Seungyeon didn’t say anything, knowing it was probably not a good idea to start scolding him in his dream since he would most likely hear one of his hyungs’ voices instead of hers. She just smiled and pushed herself back up from the table.
“Let’s just get started, shall we?” she muttered, dismissing the previous conversation.
She reached for the velvet bag again and pulled it open, scooping out another fistful of pixie dust. Kyuhyun sat in place obediently and didn’t say a word while Seungyeon sprinkled the dust over all the chess pieces, even the ones on his side. Some of the dust fell onto his shirt when Seungyeon stretched her arm across to reach the pieces on the very edge, and Kyuhyun played with it in his fingers as he waited. His eyes widened when the chess pieces came to life and started shuffling by themselves, like a real chess game. Kyuhyun watched in silent awe as Seungyeon’s white pieces attacked his black pieces, checkmate here and checkmate there, their movements becoming faster and faster and faster until he could no longer tell what was what.
The chess pieces were literally flying across the board, so fast that Kyuhyun felt that it was a hazard, leaning back in fear that it would hit in him the face. He was so worried about getting knocked in the head that he didn’t see straight away that something was glowing right above it, the swishing noises of the moving pieces becoming a loud humming sound and expelling a powerful force that was threatening to blast both Seungyeon and Kyuhyun away.
Kyuhyun gripped onto the table for dear life while Seungyeon watched apprehensively as the glow took physical form. She nervously bit her lip and raised her hand to the object. Coincidentally, it was then that it stopped glowing and all else ceased once she touched it, and the sudden loss of pressure threw Kyuhyun back down hard onto his seat. Dazed, he puffed out a breath of relief and brushed his messy bangs out of his face when he saw Seungyeon take down what seemed to be a playing card. She peered at it curiously, reading something on the front.
“Every pawn is a potential queen,” she read out. Kyuhyun blinked, still disorientated from the effects of the wind.
“Excuse me?”
“Chess,” Seungyeon said, looking up at him meaningfully and waving the card over the set in front of them. “I was talking about chess.” She pointed at a pawn among the scattered pieces. “Every pawn is a potential queen.”
“What does that mean?” Kyuhyun asked. Seungyeon threw down the card and leaned back on her chair, emitting a defeated sigh.
“I have no idea.” The crown slipped off and fell over her right eye, much to her annoyance, and she carelessly pushed it back up. Kyuhyun watched her with a wooden expression.
“Aren’t you supposed to give me a hint or something?” he deadpanned.
“Don’t look at me,” she piped, waving her hands in defense. “I’m just a figment of your imagination, I only know as much as you know.”
This was getting ridiculous.
“Yah, what kind of dream are you supposed to be when you don’t even know what’s going on?” Kyuhyun complained. “At least tell me why you’re dressed as the Queen of Hearts when we’re talking about chess!”
“What, so it’s my fault now?” Seungyeon scoffed, offended. “How am I supposed to know how your brain works and comes up with things like these??”
“But you are my brain!” Kyuhyun shot back exasperatedly, not even caring how really ridiculous he was sounding. “You’re supposed to know!”
“I had to wear this dress because of you!” she snapped, becoming self-conscious and turning a deep red very much like the Queen of Hearts in the Disney movie. “This is your fault!! You think I would’ve worn this outfit if I had a choice?! You think I wanted to look this ridiculous in front of you?! You think I even wanted to bother telling you what you're supposed to do here, YOU JERK?!”
Kyuhyun went quiet and shrunk back. He was taken aback by the unexpected outburst because it seemed that even as a dream, Seungyeon was clearly having a worse day than him. He cautiously held up his hands.
“Okay…” he said slowly, hoping to calm the situation. “I’m sorry I made you wear the Queen of Hearts outfit.” The Kara member crossed her arms in a sulk, looking over at the far corner instead. “I’ll try to imagine you in more comfortable clothes next time.”
Seungyeon sighed again.
“No, no... I guess I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” she said meekly. She pushed up her crown again. “It’s not like you’re in control of your subconscious or anything.”
Kyuhyun chuckled dryly, not really knowing how else to react. He picked up the card she had pushed over to him and examined it closely, reading the chess phrase over and over again but to no valid. He still had no idea what it meant. Seungyeon watched him with a mild smile, reading his thoughts.
“You should ask someone who knows about chess,” she suggested. “Maybe they’ll understand what it means.” Kyuhyun considered her advice for a second or two.
“Should I?” he mumbled unsurely, scratching his head and narrowing his eyes at the card. Seungyeon reached over the table and placed her finger under his chin, bringing up his face to look at her. She grinned.
“Yeah,” she said sweetly. “But you should wake up first.”
---------------------------------------------
And Kyuhyun did wake up, in his bed, in his room as if he had never left, since he never really left. But as he opened his eyes and his vision took a few moments to refocus themselves at the ceiling, a rush of fatigue came over him, the swirling in his mind from the dream taking his energy as if he had really gone on a wild adventure down a rabbit hole that night before.
The groggy feel of the morning wake weighed down heavily on his head as he sat up a little, making it a struggle to push himself up completely from the bed. The sun was just coming up and the sky was still looking grey, but Kyuhyun felt no use in trying to go back to sleep even though he was tired. He coughed and scratched his hair, not bothering to stay quiet because he knew even without looking that his roommate wasn’t in his bed. It was in Sungmin’s daily routine to wake up around this time and go out to buy some food to make breakfast for the members like he always did.
Kyuhyun sighed and untangled himself from his blanket and set his feet down on the ground. There was a whoosh of cold air that made him wince, and he quickly reached for his sweater at the side of his bed and pulled it over his head. Kyuhyun hugged himself and shivered for a moment or two before he finally stood up, carelessly pulling his crumpled heap of a blanket back in place over his mattress and tucking it in at the sides so that it looked like it was neatly made. He’d deal with Sungmin’s nagging about this habit later.
He hazily made his way out of his bedroom, dragging his feet behind him. He was more conscious than he’d usually be at this hour, but with his mind still preoccupied with the weird dream, he couldn’t clear his head at all from the random chess phrase Seungyeon, or the dream that resembled Seungyeon, had read out to him.
Every pawn is a potential queen. Every pawn is a potential queen... Gah, what does it mean?
Kyuhyun shuffled into the kitchen and went straight for his chair where he always sat, pulling it without much thought or strength as the wooden leg scraped loudly and cringe-worthingly on the matted floor, something Kyuhyun usually couldn’t stand. Unfazed, he plopped down on his chair and just sat there, blinking and completely motionless for a full minute.
He repeated the chess metaphor in his head over and over, but when the meaning behind the words still didn’t come and it began to physically hurt to think, Kyuhyun sighed and dropped his head down with a loud thump on the hard wooden surface of the table.
“Wow, you okay there?” Sungmin’s voice came from behind him.
Kyuhyun groaned and struggled to push himself up from the table to look over in the direction of the front door, where he saw Sungmin, having returned from his morning outing and apparently heard the sound of impact of Kyuhyun’s skull on the wood even at the distance. Sungmin stepped inside the house and closed the door with his foot, looking very cold and grinning sheepishly with a bag of groceries in his arms. He smiled and went over to the table as Kyuhyun rubbed his forehead, setting the bag down and unpacked the items out onto the table. He pulled out a carton of milk, the sight of it triggering Kyuhyun’s thoughts and the craving he had all night long, prompting him to get up and head over to the cupboard. Sungmin glanced over at him concernedly.
“Are you okay?” he asked again good-naturedly. “You’re up unusually early this morning.” Kyuhyun nodded subtly without a word and closed the cupboard door with a snap after taking out a glass, rubbing it on his sleeve.
“I was just thirsty,” he mumbled, sitting down again. He set the glass back down and gazed up sulkily at the older member. “Who drank all the milk last night anyway?” Sungmin just chuckled but said nothing. He opened the cardboard mouth of the carton with a swift push of his fingers, went over and poured some milk into the maknae’s empty glass without even having to ask permission.
Kyuhyun sighed, resting his elbows on the table to hold up his head and watched the pure white liquid gushing into the glass with a pout. Sungmin stopped accordingly when it filled it up to the brim and withdrew, allowing Kyuhyun to then pick it up and take a much-needed sip, savouring the taste as his deadpan gaze lingered on the opposite wall. Sungmin started packing away the groceries into the cupboard and fridge, and eventually the silence prompted Kyuhyun’s mind to wander away from thinking deeply about the chess reference as his eyes drifted back over to his hyung, who emitted a sigh and started taking off his jacket that he was still wearing from walking back during the cold morning. Something clicked at the back of his mind.
Sungmin hyung. Sungmin hyung could be someone who knew about chess.
“Hyung,” Kyuhyun said finally. Sungmin glanced over at him, and Kyuhyun wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Want to play a game of chess?”
Sungmin folded up his jacket and turned his body around to face Kyuhyun’s direction, an intrigued and curious smile on his face.
Now, it wasn’t like Kyuhyun had never played chess before. He had, but it wasn’t necessarily something he had interest in, so in that case he’d have most likely played it once, didn’t win, got bored and moved on back to his games instead, hence either forgetting or never really learning the tactics. Chess was a complicated game in Kyuhyun’s opinion, and if he had half the mind to be as enthusiastic about it as he was for his games, he was sure it required just as much strategy and thinking.
But today he put in genuine effort to pay attention as he and Sungmin pulled out a chess set from the bookshelf. Siwon had brought it over to play when it was raining and they had no schedules, only put it away when no one (who was home at that moment) wanted to play with him. Sungmin remarked with amusement at Kyuhyun's sudden interest in learning the game, but was delighted nonetheless and talked him through as the maknae watched closely.
The minutes stretched after Sungmin finished laying out all the specifics and ground rules and they were into their first attempt at a game. Kyuhyun stayed focused and anxiously chewed on his thumbnail as he stared at his black rook piece, calculating whether it was a good idea to go ahead and use it or if that would be an irrelevant move since his knight was in danger with a white bishop just two spaces away from it, its owner showing no signs of nervousness.
This went on for another 20 minutes until Yesung woke up and came downstairs from his room, passing through the living room to get his morning coffee. He glanced carelessly at the chess board as he walked by, exchanging a look with Sungmin, who smiled and jerked his thumb over his shoulder to indicate there was coffee, before he disappeared into the kitchen.
As the curious person he was, Yesung then predictably popped back in again with a cup in his hands.
“Are you guys playing chess?” he asked, going over to sit on the spot next to Kyuhyun. He laughed lightly, eyeing the youngest member. “I didn’t think you’d have the patience to be away from your games.” Sungmin chuckled, picking up his bishop and effectively knocking over Kyuhyun’s knight, much to the maknae’s dismay.
“I’m not sure either,” he laughed. “Kyuhyunnie just felt like learning it this morning.”
Kyuhyun sighed and collapsed back on the sofa, exhausted and frustrated but still eyeing the chess pieces. Sungmin reached over the coffee table and playfully poked the side of Kyuhyun’s knee, the older members both looking concerned.
“What’s wrong, Kyuhyun?” Yesung asked, imitating his move and sloping back too. He nudged him with his elbow. “You never play chess, but I wake to find you already up so early doing this. Something’s not right.”
Kyuhyun fidgeted with his fingernails.
“It’s nothing,” he muttered, shaking his head.
“It’s not nothing,” Yesung said in a stern but soft voice, elbowing him gently again. “Is it embarrassing?”
Kyuhyun wrinkled his forehead, repressing a cringe and just crossing his arms in silence without looking at either of them. Yesung exchanged a look with Sungmin and both of them tried hard not to smile; this reaction could mean one of two things; either Kyuhyun was having trouble with love, or he had a dirty dream. However, this was Kyuhyun they were talking about, either choice was equally as intriguing and the two hyungs could barely hold back from just bursting for him to spill it.
But it was a known fact that Kyuhyun was weirder than ordinary people and it took different methods and approaches for him to open up, especially if his pride was on the line. He was worst than Heechul sometimes, because if he didn't want to tell them something, they could very well never find out, no matter how much they tried to get it out of him.
It was better to encourage him than force him.
Sungmin grinned with mischief, crawling onto the sofa as well over onto Kyuhyun’s other side. He leaned over and nudged Kyuhyun’s shoulder with his head coaxingly.
“Tell us, Kyuhyun ah,” he said in a tender, persuasive voice. “You know you can tell us anything.”
Kyuhyun sighed, staring blankly out front at the television set at the opposite wall, feeling his hyungs’ gazes piercing at him. His head cushioned on the back of the sofa, Kyuhyun heaved a sigh that relaxed his body completely, making him even more limp, almost melting back on the spot he was sitting/lying.
Honestly, he really was dying to tell someone, desperately wanting to know what the quote meant and what the heck he was supposed to do, knowing their advice would be good for him and both Sungmin and Yesung were always wise and looking out for him... but it was just so embarrassing.
He had a dream about Seungyeon. It was a chaste dream, but a dream nonetheless. He was sure they would only think one thing of it and it irked him, but the subconscious bite of his tongue to stop himself from opening his mouth to just reveal it all was getting annoying.
Kyuhyun picked up his glass and took another swig of milk as Yesung and Sungmin waited patiently. The maknae heaved one last sigh and finally, finally started telling them.
He went on to explain every exact detail, from falling through the hole in the floor and parachuting down with his PJs, to being greeted by the sight of a scene plagiarized straight out of a children’s book.
He told them everything... except the identity of the girl.
When he finished, he downed the rest of his milk and waited nervously on the reactions to hearing this bizarre dream. Yesung and Sungmin were quiet, deep in thought about what to make of this. Neither asked or pondered who the girl was, since the way Kyuhyun had purposely told the story made it seem like it wasn’t a big deal in the context, much to his relief. Sungmin frowned and stroked his chin, all three of them now sitting in the same position side by side together, their bodies slumped on the sofa and their feet on the coffee table, all staring at the ceiling.
After a while, the silence broke with Yesung’s loud sigh before he tilted his head a little to Kyuhyun.
So, you're saying the girl was dressed like the Queen of Hearts?” he asked.
Kyuhyun nodded.
“In a game of chess?” Sungmin queried, arching an eyebrow with amusement.
Kyuhyun smiled wryly; they all seemed to have the same brain-length on that matter.
“Yep,” he replied gruffly.
“And you can’t remember her face at all?”
Kyuhyun hesitated a little, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down as he swallowed out of nervousness, but he bit down and firmly shook his head.
“No,” he lied.
There was a beat, and Kyuhyun could almost hear his own heart.
“But... but she was pretty though,” he added quickly with a shrug, hoping the casual comment would distract from the fact that he was so clearly lying, something he was usually good at. Thankfully it seemed Yesung and Sungmin didn't notice because Sungmin pulled out his iPhone, tapped a few things before sitting up.
“Is this what she was wearing?” he asked, holding it out in Kyuhyun’s face.
Kyuhyun naturally reacted and automatically drew his head back when Sungmin thrust the iPhone right at him, becoming cross-eyed for a second before he grabbed it and pulled it away from his face. Kyuhyun pushed himself up on his seat and stared at the screen. His eyes widened slightly.
It was a Naver search on the Queen of Hearts, from the soon-to-be-released American movie Alice in Wonderland, and Kyuhyun was surprised the costume was correct down to the smallest detail of what Seungyeon had been wearing in the dream.
Wow, and the movie wasn’t even going to be released until next year, yet here he was dreaming about it.
“What does it mean?” he mumbled confusedly, scratching his head. He glanced up at Sungmin, who was now sitting on the armrest of the chair.
“Well, usually dreams about pretty girls in cosplay costumes would lead into something very… what’s the right word I can use… different than what you dreamt about,” the older member replied, tapping his chin with the tip of his finger thoughtfully. “But since that’s not the case here, it’s probably something else.”
Yesung started snickering.
“You’re still so innocent, Kyuhyun ah,” he chuckled, lovingly squeezing the magnae’s shoulder as Kyuhyun continued to blink dubiously at the picture.
“What did that quote mean anyway?” he muttered, still confused since the hyungs were being no help so far. “Every pawn is a potential queen.”
“I thought you knew how to play chess,” Yesung said with a frown. Kyuhyun ignored him, handing Sungmin back the iPhone.
“Explain it to me,” he told both of them.
“As a game tactic or as a metaphor?” Sungmin asked, sliding down from the armrest back onto the sofa beside Kyuhyun.
“A metaphor, I guess.”
“We’ll start with the tactics first,” Sungmin said matter-of-factly, taking out a pen from under the coffee table. “And then Jongwoon hyung will figure out the metaphor.”
He pulled the chess board over in front of them, setting aside all the pieces neatly.
“Every pawn is a potential queen...” he explained, picking up a white pawn and placing it on the edge of the board as Kyuhyun and Yesung watched closely with their full attention. “But it usually unlikely and very risky, and only one pawn piece actually has a real chance.”
“You said it was a pretty girl, right?” Yesung said, glancing at Kyuhyun. “And she was dressed as the Queen of Hearts.”
Kyuhyun nodded woodenly. He furrowed his brows, staring at the pawn as if the harder he stared, the more sense it would make, which it didn’t. He nibbled on his thumbnail, getting increasingly nervous in ways he didn’t quite understand yet.
“Have you recently become closer to any of your female colleagues?” Sungmin asked out of the blue. Kyuhyun blinked, snapping out of his trance.
“Uh... well…” Alright, be cool. There’s no way they can possibly narrow it down to Seungyeon on the first try. “Yeah, I’ve become close to some of them. Why do you ask?”
“In a game of chess, a pawn is the weakest piece on the board, but if you stick to it, the fewer pieces left on the board, the greater the pawn’s power. It’s the only piece that can transform during a game. So if you make it to the last row of the opposite side, the pawn can be promoted to any other piece besides the king.” He took out the other pieces and set them around the board, pointing at the white king. “The next highest rank is the queen.”
He pointed at the queen, placed right in front of Kyuhyun. The maknae blinked again.
“And... this means?”
Yesung reached over and picked up the pawn piece, holding it to Kyuhyun.
“If you take it as the pawn is representing a girl, it means the pawn must be a person who’s always been... just another person to you for a long time,” he told him. He let Kyuhyun hold it, examining it closely.
“You felt nothing towards her,” Sungmin continued for him. “No closeness but no hatred, she’s just someone you always pass by without realizing. Always standing just a small distance away but never looked at, because there was no reason, she wasn’t someone you really ever needed to talk to. But now when you finally paid attention to her, you see that she’s always been there with you, not directly by your side but she has seen what you’ve seen and gone through what you’ve gone through, so now… she’s reached the other end and become a very important piece in the game.”
Kyuhyun’s eyes widened when a thought finally dawned on him, everything he was confused about suddenly falling into its place.
“So, you’re saying there’s a girl I used to never take notice of, and she’ll become an important person in my life?”
He could barely feel the words leave his own lips, frozen in his spot as out of nowhere all the memories and realizations came gushing into his mind. This and that, this little thing and that little thing… it was all joining together like a very bizarre but very real jigsaw puzzle.
“Not just any person,” Sungmin told him, taking the pawn from between Kyuhyun’s loose fingers. He set it down with a loud clank on the board, where it stood in recognized glory at the winning side. “You see, Kyuhyun ah, in chess... you are the king. You lose your king, it’s over.”
Sungmin knocked over the king with his hand, then wiped the board clear of all the pieces except the one white pawn. Yesung pegged his chin on Kyuhyun’s shoulder and pointed at the sole surviving piece on the entire board.
“But if you make it to the endgame and that pawn piece becomes a queen,” he said. “It then becomes your queen.”
“My… my queen?”
“Your soulmate, Kyuhyun.”
Kyuhyun felt his heart stop for the millionth time, breathing and brain function ceasing as everything around him suddenly came to a standstill.
Was this why he was given such a strange dream that even took a stab at his pride at some point, but in the end it had a meaning after all? Was this the meaning? Was this why Seungyeon was in it? Was this a twisted way of his brain telling him that he had fallen in love with her? Was it?
“My soulmate?” he croaked, struggling to find his voice again. He looked at his two members with wide desperate eyes, his heart pounding excitedly at his throat. “Are… are you serious?”
There was another long pause.
A very long pause.
“Of course not.”
Yesung and Sungmin burst out laughing.
“I was just making it up!” Sungmin chortled. A blank Kyuhyun nearly buckled forward when he slapped his back in his fit of laughter. “I have no idea what it means. You should’ve seen your face when you thought it was true!”
The mean hyungs fell over laughing and high-fived each other while the usually stoic maknae to sat rigidly in his embarrassment.
It took a moment for Kyuhyun to realize he had been fooled, not quite recovering yet from the intense epiphany that Sungmin and Yesung might have unintentionally uncovered. He pursed his lips together and sank into a sulk, a shade of scarlet rising in his cheeks despite his attempt to stay pokerfaced.
“Oh come on, Kyuhyun ah,” Sungmin said good-naturedly. “It’s just a chess strategy. Just forget about it.”
Kyuhyun said nothing and just stared wistfully at the empty milk glass, waiting for the roaring laughter to cease when one of them would have to stop to breathe… or choke on their saliva or whatever.
“You’ve been drinking apple juice again before going to bed, haven’t you?” Yesung chuckled. “You know you always get weird dreams when you do that.”
The teasing went on for a few more minutes until finally the two elder Super Junior members sighed with satisfaction in themselves, got up from their seats, tousled Kyuhyun's hair and both headed to the kitchen again for some breakfast, leaving Kyuhyun behind to sit in his thoughts.
His eyes didn’t shift away from the lone pawn piece in the middle of the table, still in front of him and placed on the end of the board. He picked up the white king and set it beside it, just two spaces away so that it would be a legit position in the game. He glanced between them, from the pawn, to the king, to the pawn, to the king, and back.
But it wasn’t a pawn anymore. It was a queen.
Was this really what it meant? That the pawn was Seungyeon, and she was now a queen?
Kyuhyun exhaled and collapsed back on the sofa, utterly exhausted and confused.
If a cryptic quote about chess was his subconscious telling him that he had feelings for Seungyeon, even Kyuhyun was completely speechless. He didn’t know what to say, what to think at all.
He had feelings for Seungyeon. He had feelings for Seungyeon.
He had feelings for Seungyeon.