BLACK DAY 14: Death at a Wedding
Title: Death at a Wedding
Written by: idolkiller
A remix of " One Wedding and No Funerals" by windowright
Pairing: (onesided?)Chanyeol/Kris, Kris/Baekhyun
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: terminal illness
Summary: Chanyeol tries to keep Kris and Baekhyun together. Alternatively: A dying man tries to stick around.
"I was the one who set them up," Chanyeol told anyone who would listen for the first four months of Kris and Baekhyun's relationship. During the first two, Baekhyun took this as a cue to leap in with a reenactment of Kris asking him out via PowerPoint while Kris shook his head and put his face in his hand. Afterwards, it was Chanyeol telling the story, Kris laughing along with his arm slung over the back of Baekhyun's chair, Baekhyun rolling his eyes and pretending to yawn.
"It's funny," Kyungsoo said after one rendition at Lu Han's place, as he and Chanyeol carried the dishes into the kitchen after dinner.
"Just wait till I forward you a copy of the slides," Chanyeol said.
"That you got them together, I mean." Kyungsoo took each plate from him, stacking them inside the dishwasher. "For some reason I always thought you and Kris would get together."
The remaining two plates smashed against the kitchen tile, and Chanyeol jumped back. "Fuck!"
Kyungsoo dropped to his knees and gingerly started collecting the shattered pieces. "Are you okay?"
Chanyeol stopped clutching his chest and inspected his fingers. "Yeah, I'm fine." He wiped off his pants and joined Kyungsoo in a crouch. "Did that scratch the floor? Shit, Lu Han's going to kill me."
"Maybe he won't notice," Kyungsoo suggested.
"That guy has eyes like a hawk when it comes to his own stuff." Chanyeol nearly pricked himself on a ceramic shard, and Kyungsoo batted his hands away. "Anyway, Kris and I are too good friends."
"What? Oh, right." Kyungsoo wasn't paying attention. "I don't know Kris that well."
"Yeah, well." Chanyeol said. "Anyway."
He sat back on his heels and watched Kyungsoo gently brush his thumbs over the grout of the tiles, feeling for danger.
This is how Chanyeol understands regret: He falls in love with Kris when he's too young to decide what to do about it, and when he figures himself out two years later, he falls sick.
Romanticism says it began sometime in high school, between the hours spent in each other's homes and on the basketball courts, but it takes a year after Kris comes out in his sophomore year of college for Chanyeol to identify his want. How he wants doesn't announce itself until after graduation: In the middle of summer, near the end of a year spent interning with a mid-sized music company, he walks out of the hospital with the crumpled print-out of a deadline in his hand.
The most effective treatments are for "quality of life." Chanyeol tries more aggressive options for six months before calling it quits. He keeps it quiet, keeps working, tries to figure out a contingency plan, tries to prioritize.
Then Kris calls him, and like a magnet, Chanyeol's stymied desires shift, snap into place.
"You're his best friend," Kris coaxes.
Chanyeol rotates his jaw experimentally, running his tongue over the powder taste of aspirin on his back teeth. The last guests left barely an hour ago. His head is still ringing from the party music, and his living room is littered with beer cans. He thinks about hanging up. "I thought I was your best friend."
"Exactly. You've got intimate knowledge of both sides of the playing field," Kris jokes. "Help me draft a plan of attack. I'll bring the beer."
"We just drank for like six hours," Chanyeol says, but Kris just laughs and hangs up.
He shows up half an hour later with a bottle of wine, showered and changed out of the crisp button-down he'd worn to Chanyeol's party into a plain tee under a long cardigan.
"To set the mood for romance," Kris says when Chanyeol takes the wine and quirks an eyebrow at the fancy label.
"Shut the fuck up," Chanyeol says with less heat than he feels. "I'll work my magic on your sorry love life after you clean my kitchen." Kris looks appalled, but Chanyeol hands him a trash bag. "You invited yourself over."
They clean the remnants of the party mess for an hour to a Beenzino mix. Kris puts up a fight when Chanyeol wants to trade vacuuming the living room for mopping the kitchen, but gives in after a five second tug-of-war over the Swiffer handle. Chanyeol scrubs at the floor with his teeth digging into his lip, not thinking of Kris waiting on the couch, rolling the bottle of wine between his large fingers, vacuum turned off and put away. Chanyeol is still a little drunk. It helps.
When Chanyeol goes out to join him, Kris has already opened the wine and poured it in two coffee mugs.
"Romance," Chanyeol notes, and tips back half his cup in one swallow.
"So buy some damn wine glasses," Kris says. "I think I'm going to ask Baekhyun out in a few days, but for the first date-"
"A few days?" Chanyeol shakes his head. "If you guys had a moment at the party tonight, you should capitalize on it." He drains his cup and gestures for the bottle. His brain has been two steps ahead since Kris called, already tackling the problem. Chanyeol is a believer in minimizing pain through head-on assault, but it doesn't budge the dread coiled in his belly like a dead snake. "You really like him?"
Kris shrugs, and says a little shyly, "I could."
Chanyeol chews on his cheek. "Right. Open up my laptop. Open up PowerPoint-I'm serious, get that look off your face. You want a date?"
Kris reaches for his own mug of wine. "I'm not drunk enough for this."
Forty-five minutes and three-quarters of the wine bottle later, Kris loudly proclaims, "I am too drunk for this," when Chanyeol tries to get him to rehearse the pitch.
"You gotta be perfect," Chanyeol warns. He's sprawled on his side, nursing the last inches of the wine with his head tucked against Kris's thigh. "Baekhyun has high standards. Even higher since you're taking this to a professional setting."
Kris groans. "This was a bad idea."
"He's a consultant, he'll lap this shit up," Chanyeol insists. "This will be the best first date story you ever get to tell."
It takes three attempts before Kris manages to get through all fifteen slides, a piece of measuring tape looped around his neck like a tie. He punctuates the recommendation with a jab of the finger before doubling over onto Chanyeol's calves. Chanyeol tries to kick him off, shaking with laughter, but Kris just shoves him back and wipes at his eyes.
"You're right, this is the best," Kris says, holding his hand out for a high-five. "I can't wait to tell the kids how Uncle Chanyeol made it all happen."
Chanyeol slaps his hand, hard. "Get Zitao to book you a conference room at Baekhyun's workplace tomorrow morning, and Baekhyun won't know what hit him."
Kris throws his head back. "I can't wait to see his face. This is so good. God, I'm nervous."
"Dude, you're gold."
"I think so too. After your help." Kris says, with a smile that makes Chanyeol's fingers curl around the wine bottle. He pats Chanyeol's knee. "God, I keep cracking up. This is hilarious, I'm going to remember it forever."
Kris must have washed his hair right after the party. Chanyeol wants to push his fingers through it. "Don't forget the meaningful pause after synergy," he says instead. "Man, I wish I could be there. Text me."
Kris does so, dutifully, an hour after Chanyeol gets into work the next day: a smiley face flashing a victory sign, followed by park chanyeol, shakespeare to my romeo!
Baekhyun invites him over two nights before the first date with Kris.
"I'm starting to sense a trend," Chanyeol deadpans. "I have a dinner thing, but I'll swing by after." He hangs up and adjusts the knot of his tie. When his phone buzzes again, Chanyeol swallows a counted handful of painkillers and grabs his keys.
Down in the lobby, Kris is waiting in a pair of creased slacks and an expensive blazer. "Ready?"
"Where to, Romeo?"
"I thought maybe the new Japanese place. Baekhyun doesn't really have a favourite food, huh?" Kris scratches the back of his head.
"Hmm." Chanyeol crosses his arms. "Do you speak Japanese?"
"What? No."
"Do you know the nice Chinese place downtown? Take him there. I think they speak Cantonese, but use Mandarin first and switch over." They're standing outside, Chanyeol waiting by the front passenger door of Kris's car as Kris migrates towards the driver's side.
Kris pauses. "Baekhyun knows what languages I speak."
"It's different when it's a date," Chanyeol says. "Am I supposed to stand here all night, or are you going to open the door for me?"
They spend the fifteen minute drive to the restaurant running through topics of conversation. Chanyeol goes through Kris's CD collection and dumps them all in a plastic bag, promising to make him "some more atmospheric mixes." He tells Kris to keep his eye on the road so Baekhyun will have the opportunity to admire his profile. When they arrive at the restaurant, he doesn't budge until Kris rounds the car and helps him out of his seat. Their allotted ninety minutes for dinner spills into a solid two. Chanyeol is laughing, uncomfortably full by the time they leave the restaurant after a round tasting of the entire dessert menu.
"Kiss?" Kris asks when they pull up at Chanyeol's building, and Chanyeol almost trips exiting the car. He sucks his lower lip into his mouth like it will cork the churning in his stomach.
"Go for it," he says.
Later, Chanyeol shows up at Baekhyun's apartment without changing out of his suit. "The Love Guru is in the house," he bellows.
Baekhyun lets him in and looks him over. "Can I borrow that tie? Wait, do you think I'll need a tie? Kris said to dress nice, but I don't understand his definition of nice. Did he tell you where we're eating?"
Chanyeol tugs the knot loose, letting the tie slither into his loose fist. "Go for it," he says, handing it over. "And get a pen and paper, because I'm only saying everything once."
After Chanyeol left the hospital the first time, he'd walked across the baked heat of the parking lot, climbed into his SUV, and sat there, perfectly still, heart pounding sixty miles an hour and knuckles white on the steering wheel. It was too hot with the windows closed, but he stared at the white sunlight striping his dashboard until his eyes stopped stinging. Whether it was because they got used to the glare or because of the deepening afternoon, he didn't know. His mouth was dry, his stomach restless. As the sun went down, Chanyeol pried one hand, then the other, off the wheel and stuck them between his thighs. He clasped them, but the hot sweatiness of his threaded fingers and palms brought no comfort. He let go and grabbed his left hand with his right, squeezing the four fingers together. He pretended it was someone else. He pretended the heat in the car was from another body. He closed his eyes and Kris's profile took shape in the blaze behind his eyelids.
If he could take anything back, it would be driving home and telling his parents and his sister the truth. A year after the diagnosis, his mother still calls every day asking him to move back home. His father forwards him articles on new treatments and second opinions from online specialists; Chanyeol deletes them unread after the first month. They both praise him for his optimism and ask him not to stay out late. Chanyeol agrees, but doesn't explain the difference between hoping and maximizing. He had tried the former, but when the chemo didn't take and left him shivering and constantly nauseated, he called it quits and agreed to the doctor's first suggestion of relief medication. Comparatively, the pancreas is a painless hit. Few, common symptoms, rapid advancement. You face a dead-end before you even know it.
Maximizing, on the other hand, is Chanyeol's specialty. He calls Kyungsoo to start the record label they've been talking about for the past two years. He says nothing else, because the last thing he needs is to be treated like glass. Yura is the only one he can trust to act normally. Every morning before work, he takes a picture of himself smiling with his phone and sends it to her. "Before your cute brother's looks go," he jokes.
"What looks," Yura sniffs, and looks away.
Three months before Kris and Baekhyun break up, Yixing tells him, "I can't tell if they're dating each other or if they're dating you." Chanyeol hides his smile in a laugh.
This is how he wants to be remembered: Alive, and associated with love.
It goes well, until it doesn't.
From the outside, Kris and Baekhyun are the perfect couple. Physically complementary and pursuing similarly competitive careers, Kris plays the fair prince to Baekhyun's woodland pixie. Looked at from a distance, their silhouettes-Kris's long profile gazing down, Baekhyun's small chin tilted up-stir storybook admiration and envy even among their friends. They're the right age, at the right time, and this is what Chanyeol tells them, the boxes he ticks off when they call, Baekhyun in the evenings after a particularly numbing dinner, Kris at three in the morning after another nightmare.
"I'm drowning," Kris says, breathing hard. Chanyeol can visualize the sweat beading his brow.
"It's way too early for a seven-year itch." Chanyeol, lying in bed, frowns at the ceiling.
Kris laughs, but it's hooked on an edge of panic. "Oh, god. I don't want to think about seven years. I can't even think about one year. Chanyeol, I can't do this."
"Why not?" Chanyeol tries not to feel personally offended. "You said last week's brunch with your mom went well. You did the salmon, right?"
"Yeah, it was great, thanks," Kris reassures him. "I just feel like I'm going through the motions. Sometimes I dream about Baekhyun and I can't see his face. I don't think I even know who he is."
"Okay." Chanyeol sits up. "Calm down. You're getting existential at," he takes his phone away from his ear to glance at the time, "almost four in the morning. Of course you know Baekhyun. Byun Baek, played on the same high school basketball team together for two years, allergic to roses and physically incapable of shutting up-"
"He's allergic to roses?" Kris demands.
"It's like we're in a movie. Kris is the ideal boyfriend, and the script is perfect. The script was written by Nicholas Sparks, except it has a happy ending. But it doesn't. I'm not happy." Baekhyun says, matter-of-fact, over the rapid-fire clicks of his computer mouse.
Chanyeol can't decide if he should take that as a compliment. He decides not to: If it was, he wouldn't be having this conversation. "But it's Nicholas Sparks," he says, and sets off nine grenades with a single keystroke. Today, the digital cries of anguish do nothing for his mood.
"So what's the problem, right?" Baekhyun slaughters an entire squadron of tiny soldiers, and hits pause. He turns to Chanyeol, mouth pursed and a tiny furrow between his eyes. He admits, "I don't know why it's just not working." Baekhyun looks lost, like he has the solution to a complex math problem but can't understand how to apply it.
Chanyeol clicks around his screen, though he had paused the game when Baekhyun did. "You're trying," he finally says, prickling with guilt. I'm trying, he thinks. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
He must look upset, because Baekhyun reaches over to pat him on the arm. "I don't know how you stand listening to our relationship problems all the time. You old saint, Kris and I never would've lasted this long without you."
"You say that like it's already over," Chanyeol says. Baekhyun's expression clouds, and he shrugs, retracting his hand. Chanyeol wants to wipe the wrinkles from Baekhyun's brow, but he's afraid moving will mean losing the moment. Baekhyun looks at him like he can still provide an answer. Chanyeol feels as though he is standing on a precipice, but he's not sure he hasn't already fallen. Maybe his hope was stronger and more bitter than he knew. Maybe he had been sabotaging himself all along. His heart, like the rest of his traitorous body, silently turning on him.
The week after Kris and Baekhyun officially separate, Chanyeol goes in for a routine check-up.
He only understands two things from the doctor's explanation of the latest set of test results: One, the disease has accelerated, and two, he has just enough time left to attend Yura's wedding. Both mean he calls up Kyungsoo as soon as he gets home, and confesses. They are two days from the official inauguration of their company, and this is the most irresponsible thing in a long line of irresponsible things he has done to Kyungsoo. Huddled under his coat on the couch, Chanyeol's mouth hurts, feels like it's stuffed with cotton. The words tumble out like river stones, and when Chanyeol hears himself say it out loud for the first time in two years, he digs his nails into the fabric of the seat cushion like he is afraid he'll fall off.
"You can take my name off the letterhead," he adds, a quiet apology.
Kyungsoo is silent, the only evidence of him still listening being the slow, steady breaths on the other end of the line. Chanyeol presses the phone to his ear hard enough to hurt.
"You've put in just as much work as I have. I'll make sure people remember that." Kyungsoo's voice has an odd quality to it, like he's underwater. "I'm not taking your name off anything, but I might append it with 'Dumbass.'"
Chanyeol clenches his jaw so hard his teeth squeak. He can't open his mouth, and he is afraid Kyungsoo will hang up, but Kyungsoo's breathing doesn't change. The exhales that filter through are soothing. Chanyeol counts them, because he can't hear his own breath, and suddenly he thinks: The first time Kris called him about Baekhyun meant fight or flee, and even before then he had known there was no point in running if there is nowhere to go. There had been no deviations or moments of weakness from him that could have made them waver. He had meant everything he did, because it was, and still is, the best he could do. If Chanyeol can't let himself love Kris, he can become a part of Kris' love. He wants to catch himself between them in amber, an inextricable memory. Maybe he is a little in love with the both of them. If you grab the knife before it strikes, you make yourself ready for the pain.
"I'll get someone for you," Chanyeol promises. He is suddenly, desperately glad he never fell in love with Kyungsoo. "I'll get someone great."
In a last-ditch effort, Chanyeol tries the oldest trick in the book: jealousy. He invites Kris as his date to Yura's wedding. It's the last chance for all three of them, and Chanyeol figures it's time to go hard before he goes home. The ploy is so blatant he half-expects Baekhyun to call him out on it to his face, but luckily all he receives is an unmerciful punch to the arm and a toss of the head. "I don't get why he's so worked up!" Chanyeol complains as loudly as he can, sniffing.
The intrigue of this new complication shakes both Kris and Baekhyun up, their post-breakup friendship too new and raw to sort genuine emotion from possessive reflex. In the month leading up to Yura's wedding, they circle each other doubtfully. Kris is understandably contrite, Baekhyun surprisingly more so. They don't lack feeling for each other. Chanyeol needs to do nothing.
Yura wants him to confess.
He tells her no.
Every day nearer to the wedding brings Kris and Baekhyun a little closer. Chanyeol can see it coalescing, and it makes him gloomy even as it delivers a grim satisfaction. It is hard to control the heart after all, he muses, and determinedly sets his focus on his work. He signs Zico, a raw sharp-tongued youth with spades of potential, and the buoyancy of being able to uphold his promise to Kyungsoo carries him through to the day of the wedding.
On the morning of, Chanyeol arrives alongside Kris in a slim-cut tux, his hair teased away from his temples and matching the colour of his peach satin tie. Kris colour-coordinates with him, dressed to the nines with his bangs swept off his forehead. The expression on his mother's face when she looks at the pair of them overburdens Chanyeol with guilt, and he hurriedly ushers Kris away after introductions, before she can say too much. They walk the length of the venue, greeting both guests and relatives. Kris is charming, handsome, and attentive, the warmth of his fingers a constant around Chanyeol's elbow.
Two hours before the ceremony, Chanyeol walks out of Yura's dressing room with a headache and a nosebleed. He grabs a tissue before he drips on his suit and lets Kris maneuver him into one of the venue's back offices. Chanyeol sits down in a too-low plastic chair and watches Kris rummage through the supply cabinets out of the corner of his eye. Broad back, long legs.
"You need to tell him," Yura had demanded. She looked beautiful, white dress and the curls of her hair pinned back with tiny glittering stars. Chanyeol's voice cracked when he told her that. "You're not happy like this."
"Who's going to be happy after I tell him?" Chanyeol countered. "Not me. Not him."
"At least for closure," she argued.
Chanyeol digs his teeth into the flesh beneath his thumbnail. His ears have been buzzing with frustration since he left his sister's dressing room. Two hours before the ceremony, and she needed to re-apply her makeup because Chanyeol made her cry. She told him, wiping away the smeared mascara along her lower lash line, that their aunt said he and Kris were a stunning couple. Chanyeol covers his mouth with the hand not pinching his nose, but recklessness winds itself around the cords of his throat, building up as clumsily as a child's sandcastle. "Why didn't we ever date?"
Kris snorts. "Is that what this is? Trap me into a relationship with you so I can't say no later?"
"No!" Chanyeol's foot kicks at the thought. "I wouldn't do that to you. We're friends." Despite the caution roaring in his ears, Chanyeol is fidgeting, half-waiting to hear something he doesn't dare articulate. A hint, an implication. Some clue that Kris has ever considered him in the same way, like admittance would mean that at least in one dimension, they become closer than they are now. The possibility will satisfy him, he tells himself.
"Isn't that why?" Kris's voice is muffled as he digs through the drawers for cotton balls. "We're friends. We never clicked that way. With Baekhyun," a pause, "it was different."
Chanyeol says before he can help himself: "I hate to break it to you, but you and him didn't click that way either." That was me, he doesn't say. He sounds juvenile speaking with his nose plugged up. He swallows twice, then a third time, trying to force down the dry hot itch of blood in his nose and the back of his throat. The nosebleed is not a symptom, but it feels like one. He's practically a drama heroine. "That's why you spent two months calling me about drowning and breaking up with him." The rush in his ears is obnoxiously loud. Somewhere in the building, someone is testing the organ.
Kris stands up, package in hand, and turns to Chanyeol. He tears the top off the bag of cotton balls, fiddling with the plastic strip before tucking it in his blazer pocket. "It's hard to explain," he says. "Sometimes I felt like I was dating a robot Baekhyun. Like when we were alone he turned into a Stepford wife version of himself."
Chanyeol lowers his head to look at him, and Kris crosses the room in two steps, fingers going to Chanyeol's jaw to tip his head back again. "Sometimes I feel like you put more into our relationship than either of us," he admits. "Sorry about that." He hands Chanyeol a wad of cotton balls, and cups his palm for the used tissue. Chanyeol makes the switch as carefully as possible, and Kris clucks him under the chin with his hand, as if to say good boy.
"So what you're saying is this isn't our first date," Chanyeol jokes weakly.
Kris laughs, fishing an iPod from his pocket. "By that standard, we've been dating all along."
Chanyeol opens his mouth to reply, but his chest feels suddenly compressed. He tries to breathe through his nose to fill his lungs, forgetting the nosebleed, and coughs, turning his head to the side to avoid dirtying his suit. Chanyeol has been on almost a quarter of Kris and Baekhyun's dates, and simulated more than a third beforehand. By some standard of measurement, he is not an outsider to the relationship. Even today's gambit, witnessed by all of Chanyeol's family and friends, feels like a familiar indulgence, like they slipped from friends to lovers so casually that neither noticed.
Kris has realized it too. Chanyeol makes to stand, and Kris's hands clap down on his shoulders, thumbs bracing either side of his jaw to keep his head still.
"Chanyeol," Kris says. Chanyeol wants to turn away but the nosebleed keeps him pinned. Kris searches his face, trying to find the words for the question on the tip of his tongue. The tentative, burgeoning demand in his gaze makes Chanyeol want to throw up. He was wrong. He shouldn't have begun this conversation. He doesn't want to know about possibility, potentiality, or the million iterations where this is something he can have. His face must betray him, because what Kris finds in his expression turns the corners of Kris's mouth up in shy, relieved pleasure. "If that's the case, I think I need a recap on all those dates."
Looking up at Kris with the round ceiling light behind him reminds Chanyeol of being at the doctor's office, and his heart quickens on instinct, the muscles in his thighs clenching to run. He dislodges Kris's hands from the sides of his neck. He says, "I think you should talk to Baekhyun."
Kris furrows his brow. "I know Baekhyun is your friend," he says, cautiously. "He's mine, too."
"You're more than friends," Chanyeol says, and he pairs it with a disarming smile to needle the tension. "You guys shouldn't give up yet."
"Chanyeol." Kris sighs, makes to run his hands through his hair before he remembers it's styled, and settles for staring at his palms. He opens them to Chanyeol. "I tried. Baekhyun tried. Hell, you did too. Thank you, so much, for putting up with us. But I don't lov-"
"You watch too many dramas," Chanyeol says, but his heart is in his throat. He can't let Kris say it. If he learned anything from his brief stint of therapy sessions at the hospital, it's the power of verbalization. He has never said he loves Kris out loud. "It's been barely a year. Real relationships are hard."
"It was easy with you," Kris points out.
Chanyeol is actually going to throw up. "I said real relationships," he snaps, and busies himself with his nose though the blood flow has already stopped.
"You just asked why we never tried it." Kris sounds more confused than upset.
Chanyeol digs his own elbow into his side, bending over when he laughs. "Dude, that was hypothetical," he says. "I'm so flattered though." He wiggles his eyebrows, showing Kris there is nothing serious or embarrassing about their conversation. "I knew even Fancy-pants Wu couldn't be immune to my charms."
The gentleness in Kris's expression is giving way to familiar amusement. "Fancy-pants? What is that, your sex fantasy nickname for me?"
"I like going by Flower-boy Park myself," Chanyeol confides.
Kris throws the bag of cotton balls at him. "How's the nose?" he asks on their way back to the main hall. "Ready to send your sister off?"
The back of Chanyeol's throat is still faintly burning. His eyes, too. He rubs them with the heel of his hand, to little effect. "Perfect, and no, never ready." Chanyeol gives one thumbs-up and one thumbs-down. "Go see Baekhyun, okay? He likes you so much."
"You think?" Kris hums. "Hey, take care of yourself. You look under the weather lately."
The morning after Yura's wedding, Kris and Baekhyun arrive at breakfast separately. They make eye contact once, across the scrambled eggs, but it is with the same type of smile they shared the previous morning, when Kris greeted Baekhyun with Chanyeol on his arm. "Did you give Baekhyun my room card?" Chanyeol asks his sister.
"I did." Yura answers him with her eyes on his cheek, like she can still see the bruise she'd concealed with makeup. It stings, where she'd slapped him across the face with the flat of her palm. You deserve better, she'd said last night, choked, and Chanyeol had put his hand on his own cheek, taken it away when he'd felt wetness brush from his eyelashes to his fingertips. He had put his arms around her, and he does so again now, in the middle of the dining hall. From where he sits, he can see Kris and Baekhyun at opposite ends of the room. Chanyeol's heart sinks, then doesn't. He knows the difference between hoping for something and making the most of it.
Written by: idolkiller
A remix of " One Wedding and No Funerals" by windowright
Pairing: (onesided?)Chanyeol/Kris, Kris/Baekhyun
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: terminal illness
Summary: Chanyeol tries to keep Kris and Baekhyun together. Alternatively: A dying man tries to stick around.
"I was the one who set them up," Chanyeol told anyone who would listen for the first four months of Kris and Baekhyun's relationship. During the first two, Baekhyun took this as a cue to leap in with a reenactment of Kris asking him out via PowerPoint while Kris shook his head and put his face in his hand. Afterwards, it was Chanyeol telling the story, Kris laughing along with his arm slung over the back of Baekhyun's chair, Baekhyun rolling his eyes and pretending to yawn.
"It's funny," Kyungsoo said after one rendition at Lu Han's place, as he and Chanyeol carried the dishes into the kitchen after dinner.
"Just wait till I forward you a copy of the slides," Chanyeol said.
"That you got them together, I mean." Kyungsoo took each plate from him, stacking them inside the dishwasher. "For some reason I always thought you and Kris would get together."
The remaining two plates smashed against the kitchen tile, and Chanyeol jumped back. "Fuck!"
Kyungsoo dropped to his knees and gingerly started collecting the shattered pieces. "Are you okay?"
Chanyeol stopped clutching his chest and inspected his fingers. "Yeah, I'm fine." He wiped off his pants and joined Kyungsoo in a crouch. "Did that scratch the floor? Shit, Lu Han's going to kill me."
"Maybe he won't notice," Kyungsoo suggested.
"That guy has eyes like a hawk when it comes to his own stuff." Chanyeol nearly pricked himself on a ceramic shard, and Kyungsoo batted his hands away. "Anyway, Kris and I are too good friends."
"What? Oh, right." Kyungsoo wasn't paying attention. "I don't know Kris that well."
"Yeah, well." Chanyeol said. "Anyway."
He sat back on his heels and watched Kyungsoo gently brush his thumbs over the grout of the tiles, feeling for danger.
This is how Chanyeol understands regret: He falls in love with Kris when he's too young to decide what to do about it, and when he figures himself out two years later, he falls sick.
Romanticism says it began sometime in high school, between the hours spent in each other's homes and on the basketball courts, but it takes a year after Kris comes out in his sophomore year of college for Chanyeol to identify his want. How he wants doesn't announce itself until after graduation: In the middle of summer, near the end of a year spent interning with a mid-sized music company, he walks out of the hospital with the crumpled print-out of a deadline in his hand.
The most effective treatments are for "quality of life." Chanyeol tries more aggressive options for six months before calling it quits. He keeps it quiet, keeps working, tries to figure out a contingency plan, tries to prioritize.
Then Kris calls him, and like a magnet, Chanyeol's stymied desires shift, snap into place.
"You're his best friend," Kris coaxes.
Chanyeol rotates his jaw experimentally, running his tongue over the powder taste of aspirin on his back teeth. The last guests left barely an hour ago. His head is still ringing from the party music, and his living room is littered with beer cans. He thinks about hanging up. "I thought I was your best friend."
"Exactly. You've got intimate knowledge of both sides of the playing field," Kris jokes. "Help me draft a plan of attack. I'll bring the beer."
"We just drank for like six hours," Chanyeol says, but Kris just laughs and hangs up.
He shows up half an hour later with a bottle of wine, showered and changed out of the crisp button-down he'd worn to Chanyeol's party into a plain tee under a long cardigan.
"To set the mood for romance," Kris says when Chanyeol takes the wine and quirks an eyebrow at the fancy label.
"Shut the fuck up," Chanyeol says with less heat than he feels. "I'll work my magic on your sorry love life after you clean my kitchen." Kris looks appalled, but Chanyeol hands him a trash bag. "You invited yourself over."
They clean the remnants of the party mess for an hour to a Beenzino mix. Kris puts up a fight when Chanyeol wants to trade vacuuming the living room for mopping the kitchen, but gives in after a five second tug-of-war over the Swiffer handle. Chanyeol scrubs at the floor with his teeth digging into his lip, not thinking of Kris waiting on the couch, rolling the bottle of wine between his large fingers, vacuum turned off and put away. Chanyeol is still a little drunk. It helps.
When Chanyeol goes out to join him, Kris has already opened the wine and poured it in two coffee mugs.
"Romance," Chanyeol notes, and tips back half his cup in one swallow.
"So buy some damn wine glasses," Kris says. "I think I'm going to ask Baekhyun out in a few days, but for the first date-"
"A few days?" Chanyeol shakes his head. "If you guys had a moment at the party tonight, you should capitalize on it." He drains his cup and gestures for the bottle. His brain has been two steps ahead since Kris called, already tackling the problem. Chanyeol is a believer in minimizing pain through head-on assault, but it doesn't budge the dread coiled in his belly like a dead snake. "You really like him?"
Kris shrugs, and says a little shyly, "I could."
Chanyeol chews on his cheek. "Right. Open up my laptop. Open up PowerPoint-I'm serious, get that look off your face. You want a date?"
Kris reaches for his own mug of wine. "I'm not drunk enough for this."
Forty-five minutes and three-quarters of the wine bottle later, Kris loudly proclaims, "I am too drunk for this," when Chanyeol tries to get him to rehearse the pitch.
"You gotta be perfect," Chanyeol warns. He's sprawled on his side, nursing the last inches of the wine with his head tucked against Kris's thigh. "Baekhyun has high standards. Even higher since you're taking this to a professional setting."
Kris groans. "This was a bad idea."
"He's a consultant, he'll lap this shit up," Chanyeol insists. "This will be the best first date story you ever get to tell."
It takes three attempts before Kris manages to get through all fifteen slides, a piece of measuring tape looped around his neck like a tie. He punctuates the recommendation with a jab of the finger before doubling over onto Chanyeol's calves. Chanyeol tries to kick him off, shaking with laughter, but Kris just shoves him back and wipes at his eyes.
"You're right, this is the best," Kris says, holding his hand out for a high-five. "I can't wait to tell the kids how Uncle Chanyeol made it all happen."
Chanyeol slaps his hand, hard. "Get Zitao to book you a conference room at Baekhyun's workplace tomorrow morning, and Baekhyun won't know what hit him."
Kris throws his head back. "I can't wait to see his face. This is so good. God, I'm nervous."
"Dude, you're gold."
"I think so too. After your help." Kris says, with a smile that makes Chanyeol's fingers curl around the wine bottle. He pats Chanyeol's knee. "God, I keep cracking up. This is hilarious, I'm going to remember it forever."
Kris must have washed his hair right after the party. Chanyeol wants to push his fingers through it. "Don't forget the meaningful pause after synergy," he says instead. "Man, I wish I could be there. Text me."
Kris does so, dutifully, an hour after Chanyeol gets into work the next day: a smiley face flashing a victory sign, followed by park chanyeol, shakespeare to my romeo!
Baekhyun invites him over two nights before the first date with Kris.
"I'm starting to sense a trend," Chanyeol deadpans. "I have a dinner thing, but I'll swing by after." He hangs up and adjusts the knot of his tie. When his phone buzzes again, Chanyeol swallows a counted handful of painkillers and grabs his keys.
Down in the lobby, Kris is waiting in a pair of creased slacks and an expensive blazer. "Ready?"
"Where to, Romeo?"
"I thought maybe the new Japanese place. Baekhyun doesn't really have a favourite food, huh?" Kris scratches the back of his head.
"Hmm." Chanyeol crosses his arms. "Do you speak Japanese?"
"What? No."
"Do you know the nice Chinese place downtown? Take him there. I think they speak Cantonese, but use Mandarin first and switch over." They're standing outside, Chanyeol waiting by the front passenger door of Kris's car as Kris migrates towards the driver's side.
Kris pauses. "Baekhyun knows what languages I speak."
"It's different when it's a date," Chanyeol says. "Am I supposed to stand here all night, or are you going to open the door for me?"
They spend the fifteen minute drive to the restaurant running through topics of conversation. Chanyeol goes through Kris's CD collection and dumps them all in a plastic bag, promising to make him "some more atmospheric mixes." He tells Kris to keep his eye on the road so Baekhyun will have the opportunity to admire his profile. When they arrive at the restaurant, he doesn't budge until Kris rounds the car and helps him out of his seat. Their allotted ninety minutes for dinner spills into a solid two. Chanyeol is laughing, uncomfortably full by the time they leave the restaurant after a round tasting of the entire dessert menu.
"Kiss?" Kris asks when they pull up at Chanyeol's building, and Chanyeol almost trips exiting the car. He sucks his lower lip into his mouth like it will cork the churning in his stomach.
"Go for it," he says.
Later, Chanyeol shows up at Baekhyun's apartment without changing out of his suit. "The Love Guru is in the house," he bellows.
Baekhyun lets him in and looks him over. "Can I borrow that tie? Wait, do you think I'll need a tie? Kris said to dress nice, but I don't understand his definition of nice. Did he tell you where we're eating?"
Chanyeol tugs the knot loose, letting the tie slither into his loose fist. "Go for it," he says, handing it over. "And get a pen and paper, because I'm only saying everything once."
After Chanyeol left the hospital the first time, he'd walked across the baked heat of the parking lot, climbed into his SUV, and sat there, perfectly still, heart pounding sixty miles an hour and knuckles white on the steering wheel. It was too hot with the windows closed, but he stared at the white sunlight striping his dashboard until his eyes stopped stinging. Whether it was because they got used to the glare or because of the deepening afternoon, he didn't know. His mouth was dry, his stomach restless. As the sun went down, Chanyeol pried one hand, then the other, off the wheel and stuck them between his thighs. He clasped them, but the hot sweatiness of his threaded fingers and palms brought no comfort. He let go and grabbed his left hand with his right, squeezing the four fingers together. He pretended it was someone else. He pretended the heat in the car was from another body. He closed his eyes and Kris's profile took shape in the blaze behind his eyelids.
If he could take anything back, it would be driving home and telling his parents and his sister the truth. A year after the diagnosis, his mother still calls every day asking him to move back home. His father forwards him articles on new treatments and second opinions from online specialists; Chanyeol deletes them unread after the first month. They both praise him for his optimism and ask him not to stay out late. Chanyeol agrees, but doesn't explain the difference between hoping and maximizing. He had tried the former, but when the chemo didn't take and left him shivering and constantly nauseated, he called it quits and agreed to the doctor's first suggestion of relief medication. Comparatively, the pancreas is a painless hit. Few, common symptoms, rapid advancement. You face a dead-end before you even know it.
Maximizing, on the other hand, is Chanyeol's specialty. He calls Kyungsoo to start the record label they've been talking about for the past two years. He says nothing else, because the last thing he needs is to be treated like glass. Yura is the only one he can trust to act normally. Every morning before work, he takes a picture of himself smiling with his phone and sends it to her. "Before your cute brother's looks go," he jokes.
"What looks," Yura sniffs, and looks away.
Three months before Kris and Baekhyun break up, Yixing tells him, "I can't tell if they're dating each other or if they're dating you." Chanyeol hides his smile in a laugh.
This is how he wants to be remembered: Alive, and associated with love.
It goes well, until it doesn't.
From the outside, Kris and Baekhyun are the perfect couple. Physically complementary and pursuing similarly competitive careers, Kris plays the fair prince to Baekhyun's woodland pixie. Looked at from a distance, their silhouettes-Kris's long profile gazing down, Baekhyun's small chin tilted up-stir storybook admiration and envy even among their friends. They're the right age, at the right time, and this is what Chanyeol tells them, the boxes he ticks off when they call, Baekhyun in the evenings after a particularly numbing dinner, Kris at three in the morning after another nightmare.
"I'm drowning," Kris says, breathing hard. Chanyeol can visualize the sweat beading his brow.
"It's way too early for a seven-year itch." Chanyeol, lying in bed, frowns at the ceiling.
Kris laughs, but it's hooked on an edge of panic. "Oh, god. I don't want to think about seven years. I can't even think about one year. Chanyeol, I can't do this."
"Why not?" Chanyeol tries not to feel personally offended. "You said last week's brunch with your mom went well. You did the salmon, right?"
"Yeah, it was great, thanks," Kris reassures him. "I just feel like I'm going through the motions. Sometimes I dream about Baekhyun and I can't see his face. I don't think I even know who he is."
"Okay." Chanyeol sits up. "Calm down. You're getting existential at," he takes his phone away from his ear to glance at the time, "almost four in the morning. Of course you know Baekhyun. Byun Baek, played on the same high school basketball team together for two years, allergic to roses and physically incapable of shutting up-"
"He's allergic to roses?" Kris demands.
"It's like we're in a movie. Kris is the ideal boyfriend, and the script is perfect. The script was written by Nicholas Sparks, except it has a happy ending. But it doesn't. I'm not happy." Baekhyun says, matter-of-fact, over the rapid-fire clicks of his computer mouse.
Chanyeol can't decide if he should take that as a compliment. He decides not to: If it was, he wouldn't be having this conversation. "But it's Nicholas Sparks," he says, and sets off nine grenades with a single keystroke. Today, the digital cries of anguish do nothing for his mood.
"So what's the problem, right?" Baekhyun slaughters an entire squadron of tiny soldiers, and hits pause. He turns to Chanyeol, mouth pursed and a tiny furrow between his eyes. He admits, "I don't know why it's just not working." Baekhyun looks lost, like he has the solution to a complex math problem but can't understand how to apply it.
Chanyeol clicks around his screen, though he had paused the game when Baekhyun did. "You're trying," he finally says, prickling with guilt. I'm trying, he thinks. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
He must look upset, because Baekhyun reaches over to pat him on the arm. "I don't know how you stand listening to our relationship problems all the time. You old saint, Kris and I never would've lasted this long without you."
"You say that like it's already over," Chanyeol says. Baekhyun's expression clouds, and he shrugs, retracting his hand. Chanyeol wants to wipe the wrinkles from Baekhyun's brow, but he's afraid moving will mean losing the moment. Baekhyun looks at him like he can still provide an answer. Chanyeol feels as though he is standing on a precipice, but he's not sure he hasn't already fallen. Maybe his hope was stronger and more bitter than he knew. Maybe he had been sabotaging himself all along. His heart, like the rest of his traitorous body, silently turning on him.
The week after Kris and Baekhyun officially separate, Chanyeol goes in for a routine check-up.
He only understands two things from the doctor's explanation of the latest set of test results: One, the disease has accelerated, and two, he has just enough time left to attend Yura's wedding. Both mean he calls up Kyungsoo as soon as he gets home, and confesses. They are two days from the official inauguration of their company, and this is the most irresponsible thing in a long line of irresponsible things he has done to Kyungsoo. Huddled under his coat on the couch, Chanyeol's mouth hurts, feels like it's stuffed with cotton. The words tumble out like river stones, and when Chanyeol hears himself say it out loud for the first time in two years, he digs his nails into the fabric of the seat cushion like he is afraid he'll fall off.
"You can take my name off the letterhead," he adds, a quiet apology.
Kyungsoo is silent, the only evidence of him still listening being the slow, steady breaths on the other end of the line. Chanyeol presses the phone to his ear hard enough to hurt.
"You've put in just as much work as I have. I'll make sure people remember that." Kyungsoo's voice has an odd quality to it, like he's underwater. "I'm not taking your name off anything, but I might append it with 'Dumbass.'"
Chanyeol clenches his jaw so hard his teeth squeak. He can't open his mouth, and he is afraid Kyungsoo will hang up, but Kyungsoo's breathing doesn't change. The exhales that filter through are soothing. Chanyeol counts them, because he can't hear his own breath, and suddenly he thinks: The first time Kris called him about Baekhyun meant fight or flee, and even before then he had known there was no point in running if there is nowhere to go. There had been no deviations or moments of weakness from him that could have made them waver. He had meant everything he did, because it was, and still is, the best he could do. If Chanyeol can't let himself love Kris, he can become a part of Kris' love. He wants to catch himself between them in amber, an inextricable memory. Maybe he is a little in love with the both of them. If you grab the knife before it strikes, you make yourself ready for the pain.
"I'll get someone for you," Chanyeol promises. He is suddenly, desperately glad he never fell in love with Kyungsoo. "I'll get someone great."
In a last-ditch effort, Chanyeol tries the oldest trick in the book: jealousy. He invites Kris as his date to Yura's wedding. It's the last chance for all three of them, and Chanyeol figures it's time to go hard before he goes home. The ploy is so blatant he half-expects Baekhyun to call him out on it to his face, but luckily all he receives is an unmerciful punch to the arm and a toss of the head. "I don't get why he's so worked up!" Chanyeol complains as loudly as he can, sniffing.
The intrigue of this new complication shakes both Kris and Baekhyun up, their post-breakup friendship too new and raw to sort genuine emotion from possessive reflex. In the month leading up to Yura's wedding, they circle each other doubtfully. Kris is understandably contrite, Baekhyun surprisingly more so. They don't lack feeling for each other. Chanyeol needs to do nothing.
Yura wants him to confess.
He tells her no.
Every day nearer to the wedding brings Kris and Baekhyun a little closer. Chanyeol can see it coalescing, and it makes him gloomy even as it delivers a grim satisfaction. It is hard to control the heart after all, he muses, and determinedly sets his focus on his work. He signs Zico, a raw sharp-tongued youth with spades of potential, and the buoyancy of being able to uphold his promise to Kyungsoo carries him through to the day of the wedding.
On the morning of, Chanyeol arrives alongside Kris in a slim-cut tux, his hair teased away from his temples and matching the colour of his peach satin tie. Kris colour-coordinates with him, dressed to the nines with his bangs swept off his forehead. The expression on his mother's face when she looks at the pair of them overburdens Chanyeol with guilt, and he hurriedly ushers Kris away after introductions, before she can say too much. They walk the length of the venue, greeting both guests and relatives. Kris is charming, handsome, and attentive, the warmth of his fingers a constant around Chanyeol's elbow.
Two hours before the ceremony, Chanyeol walks out of Yura's dressing room with a headache and a nosebleed. He grabs a tissue before he drips on his suit and lets Kris maneuver him into one of the venue's back offices. Chanyeol sits down in a too-low plastic chair and watches Kris rummage through the supply cabinets out of the corner of his eye. Broad back, long legs.
"You need to tell him," Yura had demanded. She looked beautiful, white dress and the curls of her hair pinned back with tiny glittering stars. Chanyeol's voice cracked when he told her that. "You're not happy like this."
"Who's going to be happy after I tell him?" Chanyeol countered. "Not me. Not him."
"At least for closure," she argued.
Chanyeol digs his teeth into the flesh beneath his thumbnail. His ears have been buzzing with frustration since he left his sister's dressing room. Two hours before the ceremony, and she needed to re-apply her makeup because Chanyeol made her cry. She told him, wiping away the smeared mascara along her lower lash line, that their aunt said he and Kris were a stunning couple. Chanyeol covers his mouth with the hand not pinching his nose, but recklessness winds itself around the cords of his throat, building up as clumsily as a child's sandcastle. "Why didn't we ever date?"
Kris snorts. "Is that what this is? Trap me into a relationship with you so I can't say no later?"
"No!" Chanyeol's foot kicks at the thought. "I wouldn't do that to you. We're friends." Despite the caution roaring in his ears, Chanyeol is fidgeting, half-waiting to hear something he doesn't dare articulate. A hint, an implication. Some clue that Kris has ever considered him in the same way, like admittance would mean that at least in one dimension, they become closer than they are now. The possibility will satisfy him, he tells himself.
"Isn't that why?" Kris's voice is muffled as he digs through the drawers for cotton balls. "We're friends. We never clicked that way. With Baekhyun," a pause, "it was different."
Chanyeol says before he can help himself: "I hate to break it to you, but you and him didn't click that way either." That was me, he doesn't say. He sounds juvenile speaking with his nose plugged up. He swallows twice, then a third time, trying to force down the dry hot itch of blood in his nose and the back of his throat. The nosebleed is not a symptom, but it feels like one. He's practically a drama heroine. "That's why you spent two months calling me about drowning and breaking up with him." The rush in his ears is obnoxiously loud. Somewhere in the building, someone is testing the organ.
Kris stands up, package in hand, and turns to Chanyeol. He tears the top off the bag of cotton balls, fiddling with the plastic strip before tucking it in his blazer pocket. "It's hard to explain," he says. "Sometimes I felt like I was dating a robot Baekhyun. Like when we were alone he turned into a Stepford wife version of himself."
Chanyeol lowers his head to look at him, and Kris crosses the room in two steps, fingers going to Chanyeol's jaw to tip his head back again. "Sometimes I feel like you put more into our relationship than either of us," he admits. "Sorry about that." He hands Chanyeol a wad of cotton balls, and cups his palm for the used tissue. Chanyeol makes the switch as carefully as possible, and Kris clucks him under the chin with his hand, as if to say good boy.
"So what you're saying is this isn't our first date," Chanyeol jokes weakly.
Kris laughs, fishing an iPod from his pocket. "By that standard, we've been dating all along."
Chanyeol opens his mouth to reply, but his chest feels suddenly compressed. He tries to breathe through his nose to fill his lungs, forgetting the nosebleed, and coughs, turning his head to the side to avoid dirtying his suit. Chanyeol has been on almost a quarter of Kris and Baekhyun's dates, and simulated more than a third beforehand. By some standard of measurement, he is not an outsider to the relationship. Even today's gambit, witnessed by all of Chanyeol's family and friends, feels like a familiar indulgence, like they slipped from friends to lovers so casually that neither noticed.
Kris has realized it too. Chanyeol makes to stand, and Kris's hands clap down on his shoulders, thumbs bracing either side of his jaw to keep his head still.
"Chanyeol," Kris says. Chanyeol wants to turn away but the nosebleed keeps him pinned. Kris searches his face, trying to find the words for the question on the tip of his tongue. The tentative, burgeoning demand in his gaze makes Chanyeol want to throw up. He was wrong. He shouldn't have begun this conversation. He doesn't want to know about possibility, potentiality, or the million iterations where this is something he can have. His face must betray him, because what Kris finds in his expression turns the corners of Kris's mouth up in shy, relieved pleasure. "If that's the case, I think I need a recap on all those dates."
Looking up at Kris with the round ceiling light behind him reminds Chanyeol of being at the doctor's office, and his heart quickens on instinct, the muscles in his thighs clenching to run. He dislodges Kris's hands from the sides of his neck. He says, "I think you should talk to Baekhyun."
Kris furrows his brow. "I know Baekhyun is your friend," he says, cautiously. "He's mine, too."
"You're more than friends," Chanyeol says, and he pairs it with a disarming smile to needle the tension. "You guys shouldn't give up yet."
"Chanyeol." Kris sighs, makes to run his hands through his hair before he remembers it's styled, and settles for staring at his palms. He opens them to Chanyeol. "I tried. Baekhyun tried. Hell, you did too. Thank you, so much, for putting up with us. But I don't lov-"
"You watch too many dramas," Chanyeol says, but his heart is in his throat. He can't let Kris say it. If he learned anything from his brief stint of therapy sessions at the hospital, it's the power of verbalization. He has never said he loves Kris out loud. "It's been barely a year. Real relationships are hard."
"It was easy with you," Kris points out.
Chanyeol is actually going to throw up. "I said real relationships," he snaps, and busies himself with his nose though the blood flow has already stopped.
"You just asked why we never tried it." Kris sounds more confused than upset.
Chanyeol digs his own elbow into his side, bending over when he laughs. "Dude, that was hypothetical," he says. "I'm so flattered though." He wiggles his eyebrows, showing Kris there is nothing serious or embarrassing about their conversation. "I knew even Fancy-pants Wu couldn't be immune to my charms."
The gentleness in Kris's expression is giving way to familiar amusement. "Fancy-pants? What is that, your sex fantasy nickname for me?"
"I like going by Flower-boy Park myself," Chanyeol confides.
Kris throws the bag of cotton balls at him. "How's the nose?" he asks on their way back to the main hall. "Ready to send your sister off?"
The back of Chanyeol's throat is still faintly burning. His eyes, too. He rubs them with the heel of his hand, to little effect. "Perfect, and no, never ready." Chanyeol gives one thumbs-up and one thumbs-down. "Go see Baekhyun, okay? He likes you so much."
"You think?" Kris hums. "Hey, take care of yourself. You look under the weather lately."
The morning after Yura's wedding, Kris and Baekhyun arrive at breakfast separately. They make eye contact once, across the scrambled eggs, but it is with the same type of smile they shared the previous morning, when Kris greeted Baekhyun with Chanyeol on his arm. "Did you give Baekhyun my room card?" Chanyeol asks his sister.
"I did." Yura answers him with her eyes on his cheek, like she can still see the bruise she'd concealed with makeup. It stings, where she'd slapped him across the face with the flat of her palm. You deserve better, she'd said last night, choked, and Chanyeol had put his hand on his own cheek, taken it away when he'd felt wetness brush from his eyelashes to his fingertips. He had put his arms around her, and he does so again now, in the middle of the dining hall. From where he sits, he can see Kris and Baekhyun at opposite ends of the room. Chanyeol's heart sinks, then doesn't. He knows the difference between hoping for something and making the most of it.