(fic)
我祈禱我能遇見所謂完美的世界
(i pray that i can meet the so-called perfect world.)
kris/lay | pg-13
read in: tiếng Việt
2008
Wu Fan takes a deep breath and pushes the door open.
The boy running through choreography in the middle of the practice room is-well, frankly, he’s not a whole lot to look at. His hair is a little too long, sticking to his neck, and his pants are so baggy that Wu Fan doesn’t understand how anyone could dance in them at all. He also has bad skin, which is something Wu Fan has a hard time abiding. That, really, is Wu Fan’s own problem, born out of years and years of needing control and finding it in small things: His own skin, the clothes he wore, the length of his hair. It isn’t really this new boy’s fault that he’s prone to breakouts.
All that aside, Wu Fan grudgingly admits, there is a certain grace to his movements, a certain raw power that sets the boy aside from the other trainees Wu Fan has seen come and go.
The music winds down and Wu Fan’s shoe squeaks against the floor. The boy jumps, glances, and then runs to turn off the stereo.
"Hello!" he says, in breathless and heavily accented Korean, bowing deeper than any trainee has ever bowed to Wu Fan before. "Ah, I’m sorry-I thought-this room was free?"
A part of Wu Fan almost wants to see how long he can string the boy along before he realizes that Wu Fan isn’t one of the Korean trainees, but there’s something earnest and sweet in the boy’s smile that makes him have mercy. He knows the feeling of not-enoughness, of needing to prove to everyone in sight that you’re worth the time and effort it takes to train you. And despite what they say about him in the showers and in the dorms, Wu Fan isn’t really all that much of an asshole. Mostly.
"You can speak Mandarin," he says, laughing to himself at the shock and then excitement that spreads over the new boy’s face. "I mean, mine’s not perfect, but-"
"No, no! It’s really good!" The boy waves his hands-his hands are really small, Wu Fan notices, with short fingers-and smiles. "I’m Zhang Yixing, I’m new."
"I’m Wu Fan," Wu Fan says. The name is still sort of unfamiliar on his tongue-he’s so used to saying Kevin, Kevin Li, Kevin Wu. But new beginnings sometimes require new names, as well, and Wu Fan had been as good as any. "The Korean teacher told me to come find you, you’re late for class."
"Late-?" Yixing looks up at the clock above the door and then crouches, burying his face in his hands and groaning. "I’m so late, I’m so late. Is teacher going to kill me? I really don’t think it would be worth it for me to die after only a month of training, that’s not really my money’s worth-"
"Just get your stuff," Wu Fan says, his words curved around a laugh that bubbles up and sticks in his throat despite himself. He’s not really the laughing type, really, but something about this guy is just weird enough to amuse him. Maybe something about the way Yixing peeks up at him through his fingers, like he’s afraid Wu Fan will suddenly become the Korean teacher and strike him dead. "She’s only going to kill you if you’re any later than you already are."
He waits in the doorway as Yixing gathers his music player and changes his shoes and shirt, shoving the extras into his gym bag and grabbing his backpack. Wu Fan reaches out a hand for the backpack, his palm up, inviting. "I’ll carry it," he says.
It’s not so much that he wants to carry it. It’s just that Wu Fan knows how easily one person’s smile can make a place feel like home, and Yixing is new, after all.
Yixing pauses for a long moment, then smiles up at Wu Fan, guileless and innocent in a way that Wu Fan isn’t used to. So few people around here are that cheerful, and fewer still are genuinely so. The smile settles in Wu Fan’s chest, just below his heart, expanding in time with his lungs when Wu Fan breathes.
"Thank you," he says, and the weight of the bag when Wu Fan hoists it over his shoulder is, oddly enough, comforting.
"Anytime," Wu Fan says, and turns to lead the way.
2012
When Wu Fan-Kris-comes home from dance practice one night, Yixing is there, and he’s cooking. It smells like home, the spices and flavors of Guangzhou, and Wu Fan inhales deeply, dropping his bag next to the door and kicking his shoes off haphazardly before he follows his nose to the kitchen. "Are you making Canto food?" he asks, leaning against the counter and peering over into the pot.
Yixing covers it protectively with one hand. "Go away," he says. "It’s not done. You stink. Take a shower and then we’ll talk."
Mature as ever, Wu Fan sticks his tongue out, and Yixing looks delighted. "Duizhang is so handsome and classy," he says, reaching out to flick Wu Fan’s tongue and then his nose. "Go, go. It’ll be ready by the time you come out."
Whatever Yixing has on his fingers is spicy and familiar, and Wu Fan savors the taste all the way to the bathroom. He savors it a little under the rush of hot water from the shower, too, and remembers the look of delight on Yixing’s face, the way his dimple sank in deep when he laughed. More shamefully, he savors the way that his shirt had slipped off one shoulder, his collarbones stark against pale skin. Wu Fan wishes he could savor a little less, maybe.
It would be easier, he thinks, if sometimes he didn’t wonder if Yixing wanted it too. Sometimes Wu Fan looks up and catches Yixing watching him with a quiet and indiscernible expression. Sometimes Yixing climbs into his bed in the middle of the night and presses his forehead against the top of Wu Fan’s spine, curls up against his back and falls asleep like that, a warm, comforting presence. Sometimes he pulls Yixing into a hug and looks down at him and catches Yixing looking up, his lips parted like he’s waiting.
It’s terrible to want your best friend this way. Terrible to always wonder and never know whether one step forward could mean the beginning or the end of everything.
When Wu Fan comes out of the shower, the food is done, and Yixing is sitting at the table arranging beansprouts on top of his rice. "That was a long shower," he says, raising an eyebrow. "Refreshed?"
"Hungry," Wu Fan replies, stubbornly refusing to give in to the desire to blush. He takes a seat across from Yixing, and they eat quietly, the only sounds coming from their chopsticks against the bowls and the clink of glasses on the table.
"Are you nervous?" Yixing asks, point-blank. "You only eat quietly when you’re nervous."
Nervous is probably an understatement. With a week to go until their debut, Wu Fan has spent more time in the rehearsal rooms this month than he has for the entire rest of his trainee days. His nights are dedicated equally to running through the choreography for MAMA, checking his enunciation obsessively, and throwing up until his stomach is empty (and then throwing up some more). Nervous would be butterflies in his stomach, a tremble in his hands. Wu Fan is terrified.
"A little," he says. The lie is loud between them.
When Wu Fan looks up, Yixing is watching him again with that strange expression, the one that Wu Fan can’t quite figure out. After a moment he shifts, trapping one of Wu Fan’s ankles between both of his underneath the table. He doesn’t meet Wu Fan’s eyes, but Wu Fan can feel the heat of Yixing’s skin through the fabric of his sweatpants, and it feels hot enough to scald him raw.
They eat like that, in silence. Wu Fan flexes his ankle in Yixing’s grip and doesn’t even think about pulling it away.
Afterwards, Yixing stands up to pick up the dishes, and Wu Fan feels his whole body cool by a degree or two. "Do you want some help?" he asks, partly out of gratitude-Yixing had cooked, after all-and partly out of a hot, selfish desire to keep Yixing close, to relish the small comforts of Yixing’s hands and ankles and the slope of his shoulder up to his neck. Yixing’s body is familiar in the simplest of ways, something Wu Fan knows well after years of sharing a room, sometimes sharing a bed, always sharing a life.
"Sure," Yixing says, handing Wu Fan a serving bowl. "You wash, I’ll dry."
Even though Yixing criticizes Wu Fan’s washing technique from start to finish, poking fun at how many places Wu Fan misses-"How could you miss that? Your hands are so big they practically cover the whole thing!"-it still feels a little like home, their laughter filling the kitchen until Lu Han sticks his head into the kitchen and glances between them.
"I’m trying to study," he says in the sweet, soft voice that both Wu Fan and Yixing knows means danger.
Holding one finger up to his lips, Yixing nods seriously. "Sorry," he says. "We’ll keep it down."
"Thank you," Lu Han says, and with one last glance, disappears back towards his bedroom.
Wu Fan and Yixing’s gazes meet over the space between them, and Yixing giggles, one hand pressed to his mouth to keep the sound inside. "Come, come," he says, catching Wu Fan by the wrist and pulling him along to the living room. The couch is empty-no time for relaxation with so few days left-and Yixing pushes Wu Fan down onto the end of it, then sprawls out and puts his head in Wu Fan’s lap. Shameless, like he is only when it’s him and Wu Fan and no one else.
"We’re going to be fine," Yixing says, his eyes closed, mouth curved in a half-smile. Instinctively, Wu Fan’s fingers thread through his hair, winding through the strands. Yixing’s hair is straight now, and brittle with chemicals, but so soft that Wu Fan can’t help himself. "Next week, I mean. Everything is going to be fine."
"How do you know that?" Wu Fan asks.
"Because I know you." Yixing hums in the back of his throat. "So I know we’ll be fine."
From anyone else, that kind of trust might be crippling. From Yixing, it makes Wu Fan’s heart feel lighter, like maybe he can take one more step forward. He doesn’t think too hard about what that means, but the knowledge settles inside his heart anyway, beating in time with his pulse. One, two. One, two.
Yixing falls asleep with his head in Wu Fan’s lap, but Wu Fan barely sleeps at all, too busy watching the rise and fall of Yixing’s chest and asking himself questions he doesn’t know the answers to.
2012/2013
The venue for the Jiangsu New Year’s Eve concert is complicated backstage, with enough flies and hallways that Kris can disappear for a moment to clear his head. It’s not often that he has the luxury of being able to do this before every performance-and he feels blessed whenever he does have the time to sneak away a little and hide behind some supports or a piece of background, eyes closed, breathing even. Remembering, even if just for a moment, that he can let the adrenaline rush his veins without letting it take him over.
"Duizhang." Yixing’s voice. Kris’ heart stops, then starts up again, faster than before. It’s mostly nerves. "Are you hiding from us?"
"I’m hiding from you," Kris says. It’s mostly the truth, which is why it rolls of his tongue so easily. But he says it as a joke, so Yixing doesn’t know which way the balance is weighted. "I should have known that would never work."
Yixing laughs. "Definitely should have known better," he agrees. He rests a hand on Wu Fan’s back, midway down, his palm warm even through the fabric of Wu Fan’s jacket. "Are you okay?"
"I’m fine."
He is fine. He’s in good health. All of his members are in good health. They were invited to Jiangsu for this concert, after all-Kris has no reason to complain.
But still.
"It’s almost the new year," Yixing says. Neither of them are wearing a watch, but Kris believes him. Yixing is always good about things like that. "They’re going to start the countdown soon. I wonder if we’ll be expected to kiss someone when the year changes?"
Kris’ eyes shoot to Yixing’s, but they’re unreadable in the darkness, his expression soft and mysterious and something Kris has never seen before. "That sounds dangerous," he says, and can’t help the way his voice catches and blurs on the last syllable. Can’t help how his desire for Yixing is hot and thick in the back of his throat, the way he can’t quite swallow it down. "How would we know if anyone even wanted to kiss us?"
The smile that curves on Yixing’s lips speaks volumes, worth a thousand words and more, and he reaches up to smooth his palm over the lapel of Kris’ jacket. "Come here, idiot," he says, and then he leans up and kisses Kris on the mouth. It isn’t insistent, isn’t particularly passionate, but it’s soft and sweet and lingering and makes Kris’ lips tingle even when Yixing pulls away.
"Normally," Yixing says, "when someone wants to kiss you, you can tell." His palm is still resting on Kris’ chest, warm, just above his heart. "Except you, Wu Fan. You’re dense."
"Hey," Kris says, laughs, and then they’re kissing again. It lasts maybe a minute, but that minute feels like a lifetime, an aeon-the distance between galaxies, maybe. Plenty long enough for Kris to fall in love.
Maybe he’s been there, already. Maybe he just had to find his way back.
"They’re looking for us," Yixing says, straightening Kris’ collar, then stepping back. "Happy New Year, duizhang."
"Happy New Year," Kris says.
Later, on stage, Yixing’s fingers brush over the inside of Kris’ wrist, nothing more than the softest brush of skin, and Kris smiles and laughs and, for once, doesn’t worry.
2015
For Wu Fan’s birthday, Yixing takes him to a small rooftop garden atop a department store in an entirely different district than their dorm-safer that way, removed from the potential of the prying eyes of fans. It’s a strange and isolated little area, a bamboo garden with warm yellow lights strung through it, grass laid down and a few tables and benches set near a stone pathway. Not something one would expect to find on the top of a department store. Wu Fan wonders how Yixing found a place like this.
“Are you giving me you for my birthday?” he asks, looping an arm around Yixing’s shoulders and pressing a kiss just below his ear.
Yixing squirms and shoves at him, laughing. “No,” he says, his expression soft and thoughtful and sweet when he looks up at Wu Fan. “Just giving you a little peace and quiet. I thought you might need it.”
There are so few times when Wu Fan thinks, Ah, I can take a breath now. Idols aren’t built to breathe. They are built to run and sing and dance and ask “How high?” when someone says “Jump.” Peace and quiet is a concept altogether foreign to Wu Fan in the years since he joined SM Entertainment, and the idea of being given some as a gift-that makes his chest feel light, expansive. “Thank you,” he says, leaning down and pressing his mouth to Yixing’s in a quiet, purposeful kiss. “I love it.”
He and Yixing lie face-up in the grass and look at the absence of stars in the Seoul sky, drowned out by light pollution and air pollution. An airplane flies overhead and Yixing points it out, laughing, names it the North Star, and they both watch its progress until it can no longer be seen.
“It’ll be two years, soon,” Yixing muses aloud, his fingers finding Wu Fan’s and lacing with them. “That’s a long time.”
“Six years that we’ve known each other,” Wu Fan adds. “That’s an even longer time.”
They’re quiet for a long moment. Wu Fan thinks about all of the things he has lost in his life, things he never had a chance to hold onto. All of his relationships had lasted less than a year, and then Wu Fan had cut them off, unwilling to take the risk that one day they would walk away.
“My father left when I was twelve,” Wu Fan says into the silence between them. “I’ve never hated anyone as much as I hated him for that. He was a deadbeat, he drank too much and treated me and my mom like crap, but-he was my father. He owed it to us to stay and he didn’t.”
What he doesn’t say:
You don’t owe it to me to stay, but you do anyway. You have known me at my best and at my absolute worst, and for some reason, you are still here.
What he doesn’t say:
I think that if you stayed with me, I could make it last forever.
Instead, Wu Fan says, “Thanks,” and hopes that Yixing understands all of the layers underneath those words, those two simple syllables that carry so much in their arms.
Yixing squeezes his hand lightly and says, “Of course.”
2018
In April, they tell EXO that they won’t be promoting together anymore as a group.
That isn’t to say that they won’t have careers anymore. The SM representative is very clear on that point. EXO will release one last mini-album in May, and then they’ll have their goodbye concert in June. After that, Baekhyun and Kyungsoo have been signed on to do the soundtrack songs for SM’s latest idol-populated drama, and Jongdae will be releasing a Japanese version of the solo mini he released domestically last August. They tell Kris that he will have a cameo role in the drama that Baekhyun and Kyungsoo are singing for, and they tell Yixing that they want him to assist with dance training and choreography, at least for a little while.
Still, they all know it for the end it is. In the silence following the representative’s words, Kris leans forward, balances his elbows on his knees. Junmyun looks like he’s on the verge of tears, even though they’ve all seen this coming for a while.
"Our visas are only good until the end of the year," Kris says. He means his, and Yixing’s, and Zitao’s, and Lu Han’s. Their visas will expire, and without a company to sponsor them, they will have no place in Korea.
The representative meets Kris’ eyes steadily, and there is sympathy there even if there is none in her tone when she says, "We are aware."
So it goes.
On the last day of April, Wu Fan finds Yixing on the balcony of their dorm, sitting in one of the plastic chairs with his feet propped up on the railing. He would look peaceful, if Wu Fan hadn’t learned to read the tapping of Yixing’s fingers against the chair’s arm just as clearly as he can read words on a page.
He rests his hand on Yixing’s shoulder. “Hey.”
When Yixing looks up at him, his eyes are dark and unfathomable, galaxies. “Hey,” he says, catching Wu Fan’s hand and pressing a kiss to the inside of his palm. It’s quiet and squirmingly intimate, something that Wu Fan wants to tuck away into a corner of his mind and never share.
“Thinking about something?”
“About what I’ll do when we’re done,” Yixing says. For once, the done means more than just promotions and photoshoots and interviews. It means everything, and the weight of that is heavy on Kris’ shoulders.
“They want you to stay as a dance teacher,” Kris reminds Yixing, but that’s the leader voice, and after a moment Wu Fan asks, “What do you want to do?”
Yixing is quiet for a long moment, his eyes searching for something in the lights of the city, and then he says, “I don’t know.”
“That’s okay.” Wu Fan threads his fingers gently through the hair at the nape of Yixing’s neck, thumbs along the curve of his shoulder. “It’s okay not to know.” He doesn’t know, either. Kris pretends to, but there are so many variables, so many uncertainties that it seems impossible to decide.
Yixing tugs at Wu Fan’s wrist until he sits down in the chair with him-on him, really-and then he presses a soft kiss to Wu Fan’s mouth. “I’ll tell you when I do,” he says, sounding like a promise that Wu Fan is all too willing to believe.
“Okay,” Wu Fan says, kissing Yixing’s nose, his eyelids, his forehead. “Me, too.”
They release their mini-album in May, and it does better than anything they’ve released in the last year. "That’s good!" Junmyun says, ever optimistic, when he hears about the digital and physical sales figures. "Isn’t that good?"
"It’s good," Kris agrees, even though he knows they both know it has more to do with nostalgia than anything. Super Junior’s last album had sold the same way-one final blaze of glory before the fire sputtered and went out. It’s not bad, but he doesn’t think he would say it’s good, either.
Junmyun sighs and glances down at his hands, folded carefully together in his lap. “I’m still having a hard time with it,” he admits, vulnerable in a way that he has only ever been with Kris. With someone who understands what it means to be a leader, to carry the weight of five other men on your shoulders.
“I know,” Kris says, nodding. “Me, too.”
Before their concert in June, Yixing kisses Wu Fan softly on the mouth and says, "Thank you." He doesn’t say for what, but Wu Fan feels the weight of it in the touch of Yixing’s hands to his shoulders, the way his eyes trace Wu Fan’s features and the small smile that pulls at his lips.
There are any number of things Kris should say, but instead Wu Fan settles on, "I love you."
When Yixing smiles, there’s a sadness to it that Wu Fan doesn’t know if he can assign to their goodbye concert, their fond farewell to the fans who have supported them all this time. "I know," he says, brushing Wu Fan’s hair off his forehead. "I love you, too."
That night, at the dorm, Wu Fan walks in on Yixing packing his things into his suitcases. "What are you doing?" he asks, even though it’s obvious, and the words come out more like an accusation than anything.
"I’m packing," Yixing says, and even though his voice is soft and placid, there’s a tension in his shoulders that can’t be ignored.
"To go where?"
"I won’t be living in the dorms anymore." Yixing folds a sweater and tucks it into his duffel. Wu Fan recognizes it-it was the sweater he had given to Yixing for the first Valentine’s Day they spent together. It wasn’t all that much, just soft red cotton, its sleeves slightly too long, but Yixing had kissed him and said, "I love it," and so Wu Fan had thought it was all right anyhow.
"Then where?"
"Home."
It takes a moment for Wu Fan to know what Yixing is talking about. For the last six years, this has been home-these dorms, and before them the dorms in Nonhyeon-dong, and before that the trainee dorms where Wu Fan and Yixing had shared a room in the years before they debuted together. But Yixing doesn’t mean this home, anymore. Wu Fan’s fingers tighten on the doorframe, the room tilting a little under his feet.
"Changsha?" he asks, his voice hollow. "I thought they wanted you to work with trainees."
"I declined." Yixing sits back on his knees, but he can’t meet Wu Fan’s eyes. "They were kind in trying to give me something to do before our visas expire, but I would rather go home to my family than be given busywork here." His palms slide over the denim of his jeans, a nervous habit Wu Fan recognizes from every other time that Yixing has been nervous. There have been many. By this time, Wu Fan and Yixing have been together for six years, give or take. The idea of Yixing being anywhere but at Wu Fan’s side makes him want to throw up. "I was going to tell you."
"When?" Why does it seem like all Wu Fan can do is ask questions? "Were you going to call me from the airport and tell me then? ‘By the way, Wu Fan, sorry, but I’m going back to China, see you around’?"
His words are cruel and his tone biting, but Yixing accepts it the way he has accepted every raw and weak and frightened part of Wu Fan. It’s a learned cruelty, taught to Wu Fan by all of the many people who have walked away from him over the course of his life. "Tomorrow," he says. "I was going to tell you tomorrow."
"And when is your flight?"
Yixing's fingers clench into fists. "Tomorrow."
Wu Fan expects it to hit him like a freight train, but instead it just slides down his spine, the knowledge cold and leaving goosebumps in its wake. "So that's how it's going to be," he says. "Five and a half years and you were going to walk away from me just like that."
"I wasn't going to walk away-" Yixing begins, but Wu Fan isn't listening, the white noise in his head too loud for words to make it through.
"You could have told me in April, when they told us that we were done," Wu Fan says, feeling off-center, like each of his words is being torn from him. "Or when we went on that weekend trip in May just before our mini dropped. Or maybe even when I fucking asked you what you were going to do after our concert, Yixing-"
"Wu Fan," Yixing says, and his voice is so small and soft that it draws Wu Fan up short for a minute. “I’m sorry.”
The apology should be enough. Wu Fan wants it to be enough.
“I didn’t know how to tell you,” Yixing says, looking at Wu Fan’s feet. As though that would be enough to conceal the way his shoulders tremble, the way his hands are fisted in his lap so tightly Wu Fan imagines the nails cutting into Yixing’s palms. “I didn’t know how to ask you-how could I ask you? To give everything up and come with me to Changsha? I could never ask you to do that. I never wanted to walk away from you-”
Wu Fan speaks, before he can stop himself, and he knows his words are cruel, but these words are words that cannot be stopped by the dam he’s trying to build in his throat. He is terrified. “Everyone walks away from me eventually,” he says, his voice soft. He can’t even be angry, anymore. “I guess I was stupid for thinking this would be different.”
He watches the way Yixing’s eyes go liquid, the way his whole body shudders. Wu Fan thinks, I will regret this for the rest of my life.
Yixing doesn’t say anything more. He folds the remainder of his clothing into his suitcase and closes it, tucks the last of his personal belongings into a box addressed to his home in Changsha. Wu Fan wonders who will send it. Probably Lu Han. He wonders if Lu Han knew, already, and didn’t tell him, out of fear or worry or some other misplaced emotion that kept Wu Fan in the dark all this time.
When Yixing starts to walk away, Wu Fan catches his wrist.
“Is this it?” he asks.
Yixing looks up at him with an expression that says all of the things Yixing cannot find a voice to speak.
"Fine," Wu Fan says. It isn’t fine, but he lets go of Yixing’s wrist anyway, because Wu Fan is not his keeper, not his jailer. Just his lover, but those come and go. "Then you just call me if you need me."
Yixing walks away. He doesn’t call for a long, long time.
2019
He gets the phone call in April.
Wu Fan meets Yixing in the lobby of a hotel in Beijing, where the floors are shined so brightly they’re impervious to footprints, and the top of the bar is carved from black marble as dark as night. A year can change a lot of things, but like always, Wu Fan steps into the room and his eyes go immediately to Yixing’s back-there are many things Wu Fan has already forgotten about the time they spent as EXO, but the way Yixing carries himself is not one of them.
Likely as not, it will never be one of them.
He slips into the empty seat next to Yixing and braces his elbows on the marble. Yixing’s hair is a little longer now, layered into his eyes, and several shades darker than it had been the last time Wu Fan saw him. He’s wearing a suit. He looks good-healthy, his cheekbones a little less pronounced.
"Long time no see," Wu Fan says. It’s a lame opener, but they have to start somewhere.
Yixing curls his fingers around the shape of his glass-he’s always had such small hands-and looks over at Wu Fan with a gaze that’s at once affectionate and curiously closed. "No kidding," he says, his dimple sinking into his cheek when he smiles. "About a year, right?"
As though Wu Fan hasn’t been counting the days. As though he doesn’t have a mental calendar that checks off every month that passes since the last words he and Yixing exchanged.
"That sounds right," he says. "I was surprised to hear from you. You’ve been busy these days, haven’t you?"
Yixing shrugs a little. Wu Fan remembers that too-how Yixing always wanted to downplay his own achievements. Like two solo albums and an Asia tour are no big deal. "I’m taking a break right now, though," he says, "between winter promotions and the album release scheduled for July. I thought it would be nice to get back in touch."
"Have you talked to any of the others?"
From the corner of his eye Wu Fan watches the way Yixing’s smile curves, a little shy, as he looks down at his drink. "No," he admits. "I talk to Zitao sometimes. He’s studying wushu now... Minseok has a spot as a host on that China-Korea friendship variety show, you know the one. I think it’s in Jiangsu."
That made sense. Minseok, while his Mandarin had never become fluent, had the kind of personality that was good for variety. Once he had learned to stop being shy about his pronunciation mistakes, that is. "That’s good," Wu Fan says. He wishes he had been brave enough to reach out, to keep better tabs on the boys-now men-who had once been his responsibility. "But then-"
"Mm?"
"Why me?"
Yixing puffs out his cheeks, shrugs, and then looks up at Wu Fan. "Why not?"
There are a million reasons why not, and Wu Fan is sure that Yixing can see all of them reflected in his eyes. He raises an eyebrow, and Yixing makes a rueful face and nods. "Fair enough," he says, rolling his glass between his palms. It’s left a wet ring on the black marble of the bartop. "I just..."
A year can change a lot. Wu Fan waits, quiet, for Yixing to speak.
"I miss you," Yixing finally says, and the words-quiet and gentle-sink their way into Wu Fan’s heart and lodge there. "I know I messed it up a lot. We both were pretty stupid, I think. But-" He looks at Wu Fan’s hands, unable to meet his eyes. "I know it’s not going to be like it was, but I would like to be friends, Wu Fan."
Wu Fan thinks about it, about all of the things they had said to each other that last night in Seoul before Yixing boarded a plane back to Changsha. How cruel they had been to each other, and how much of it he now knows was born not of anger, but of a need to protect themselves. Stupid boys and their stupid words, and now, a year later, Wu Fan can’t find a single word to say. He wonders if Yixing wants to say as much to him as Wu Fan wants to say to Yixing. If there are as many words heavy on the tip of his tongue, tucked into his cheeks like secrets.
"I," he says, and then his voice fails.
Yixing lifts his glass and swallows the last sip of his drink, then sets it down again, right in the ring of condensation left on the marble. "Okay." He reaches into his jacket and withdraws a keycard, which he places gently to the right of his glass, next to Wu Fan’s hand. "I’m in 2201," he says, offering Wu Fan a small smile. "If you change your mind."
For a moment, something about this scenario gives Wu Fan such a strong sense of deja vu that the world tilts around him. Yixing, walking away. The line of Yixing’s shoulders, defeated, as he doesn’t look back. A year ago, Wu Fan had waited-hoped-that Yixing would look back, but now-just like then-his eyes stay forward, and he walks away.
The card sits next to his hand, white against the black bartop. Wu Fan looks at it, and wonders if he would ever forgive himself for not taking the hand that Yixing has offered.
No, he thinks. Probably not.
The elevator ride to the twenty-second floor takes an eternity, and Wu Fan is a new man by the time he steps out into the carpeted hallway. The keycard feels heavy in his hand, its weight a promise, and when he stops in front of Yixing’s door he asks himself if it’s a promise he’s willing to make. Or, more importantly-if it’s a promise he’s willing to keep.
He slides the keycard into the lock, listens as tumblers disengage and electric parts buzz. From inside, Yixing’s voice says, "Come in."
Wu Fan takes a deep breath and pushes the door open.
note: This is truthfully a little silly and not as well-developed as I would have liked for it to be, but I think it's time for me to be done with it. ♥ And of course, this should go without saying, but please do not take anything in this story as factual-it is, after all, merely fanfiction.
(i pray that i can meet the so-called perfect world.)
kris/lay | pg-13
read in: tiếng Việt
2008
Wu Fan takes a deep breath and pushes the door open.
The boy running through choreography in the middle of the practice room is-well, frankly, he’s not a whole lot to look at. His hair is a little too long, sticking to his neck, and his pants are so baggy that Wu Fan doesn’t understand how anyone could dance in them at all. He also has bad skin, which is something Wu Fan has a hard time abiding. That, really, is Wu Fan’s own problem, born out of years and years of needing control and finding it in small things: His own skin, the clothes he wore, the length of his hair. It isn’t really this new boy’s fault that he’s prone to breakouts.
All that aside, Wu Fan grudgingly admits, there is a certain grace to his movements, a certain raw power that sets the boy aside from the other trainees Wu Fan has seen come and go.
The music winds down and Wu Fan’s shoe squeaks against the floor. The boy jumps, glances, and then runs to turn off the stereo.
"Hello!" he says, in breathless and heavily accented Korean, bowing deeper than any trainee has ever bowed to Wu Fan before. "Ah, I’m sorry-I thought-this room was free?"
A part of Wu Fan almost wants to see how long he can string the boy along before he realizes that Wu Fan isn’t one of the Korean trainees, but there’s something earnest and sweet in the boy’s smile that makes him have mercy. He knows the feeling of not-enoughness, of needing to prove to everyone in sight that you’re worth the time and effort it takes to train you. And despite what they say about him in the showers and in the dorms, Wu Fan isn’t really all that much of an asshole. Mostly.
"You can speak Mandarin," he says, laughing to himself at the shock and then excitement that spreads over the new boy’s face. "I mean, mine’s not perfect, but-"
"No, no! It’s really good!" The boy waves his hands-his hands are really small, Wu Fan notices, with short fingers-and smiles. "I’m Zhang Yixing, I’m new."
"I’m Wu Fan," Wu Fan says. The name is still sort of unfamiliar on his tongue-he’s so used to saying Kevin, Kevin Li, Kevin Wu. But new beginnings sometimes require new names, as well, and Wu Fan had been as good as any. "The Korean teacher told me to come find you, you’re late for class."
"Late-?" Yixing looks up at the clock above the door and then crouches, burying his face in his hands and groaning. "I’m so late, I’m so late. Is teacher going to kill me? I really don’t think it would be worth it for me to die after only a month of training, that’s not really my money’s worth-"
"Just get your stuff," Wu Fan says, his words curved around a laugh that bubbles up and sticks in his throat despite himself. He’s not really the laughing type, really, but something about this guy is just weird enough to amuse him. Maybe something about the way Yixing peeks up at him through his fingers, like he’s afraid Wu Fan will suddenly become the Korean teacher and strike him dead. "She’s only going to kill you if you’re any later than you already are."
He waits in the doorway as Yixing gathers his music player and changes his shoes and shirt, shoving the extras into his gym bag and grabbing his backpack. Wu Fan reaches out a hand for the backpack, his palm up, inviting. "I’ll carry it," he says.
It’s not so much that he wants to carry it. It’s just that Wu Fan knows how easily one person’s smile can make a place feel like home, and Yixing is new, after all.
Yixing pauses for a long moment, then smiles up at Wu Fan, guileless and innocent in a way that Wu Fan isn’t used to. So few people around here are that cheerful, and fewer still are genuinely so. The smile settles in Wu Fan’s chest, just below his heart, expanding in time with his lungs when Wu Fan breathes.
"Thank you," he says, and the weight of the bag when Wu Fan hoists it over his shoulder is, oddly enough, comforting.
"Anytime," Wu Fan says, and turns to lead the way.
2012
When Wu Fan-Kris-comes home from dance practice one night, Yixing is there, and he’s cooking. It smells like home, the spices and flavors of Guangzhou, and Wu Fan inhales deeply, dropping his bag next to the door and kicking his shoes off haphazardly before he follows his nose to the kitchen. "Are you making Canto food?" he asks, leaning against the counter and peering over into the pot.
Yixing covers it protectively with one hand. "Go away," he says. "It’s not done. You stink. Take a shower and then we’ll talk."
Mature as ever, Wu Fan sticks his tongue out, and Yixing looks delighted. "Duizhang is so handsome and classy," he says, reaching out to flick Wu Fan’s tongue and then his nose. "Go, go. It’ll be ready by the time you come out."
Whatever Yixing has on his fingers is spicy and familiar, and Wu Fan savors the taste all the way to the bathroom. He savors it a little under the rush of hot water from the shower, too, and remembers the look of delight on Yixing’s face, the way his dimple sank in deep when he laughed. More shamefully, he savors the way that his shirt had slipped off one shoulder, his collarbones stark against pale skin. Wu Fan wishes he could savor a little less, maybe.
It would be easier, he thinks, if sometimes he didn’t wonder if Yixing wanted it too. Sometimes Wu Fan looks up and catches Yixing watching him with a quiet and indiscernible expression. Sometimes Yixing climbs into his bed in the middle of the night and presses his forehead against the top of Wu Fan’s spine, curls up against his back and falls asleep like that, a warm, comforting presence. Sometimes he pulls Yixing into a hug and looks down at him and catches Yixing looking up, his lips parted like he’s waiting.
It’s terrible to want your best friend this way. Terrible to always wonder and never know whether one step forward could mean the beginning or the end of everything.
When Wu Fan comes out of the shower, the food is done, and Yixing is sitting at the table arranging beansprouts on top of his rice. "That was a long shower," he says, raising an eyebrow. "Refreshed?"
"Hungry," Wu Fan replies, stubbornly refusing to give in to the desire to blush. He takes a seat across from Yixing, and they eat quietly, the only sounds coming from their chopsticks against the bowls and the clink of glasses on the table.
"Are you nervous?" Yixing asks, point-blank. "You only eat quietly when you’re nervous."
Nervous is probably an understatement. With a week to go until their debut, Wu Fan has spent more time in the rehearsal rooms this month than he has for the entire rest of his trainee days. His nights are dedicated equally to running through the choreography for MAMA, checking his enunciation obsessively, and throwing up until his stomach is empty (and then throwing up some more). Nervous would be butterflies in his stomach, a tremble in his hands. Wu Fan is terrified.
"A little," he says. The lie is loud between them.
When Wu Fan looks up, Yixing is watching him again with that strange expression, the one that Wu Fan can’t quite figure out. After a moment he shifts, trapping one of Wu Fan’s ankles between both of his underneath the table. He doesn’t meet Wu Fan’s eyes, but Wu Fan can feel the heat of Yixing’s skin through the fabric of his sweatpants, and it feels hot enough to scald him raw.
They eat like that, in silence. Wu Fan flexes his ankle in Yixing’s grip and doesn’t even think about pulling it away.
Afterwards, Yixing stands up to pick up the dishes, and Wu Fan feels his whole body cool by a degree or two. "Do you want some help?" he asks, partly out of gratitude-Yixing had cooked, after all-and partly out of a hot, selfish desire to keep Yixing close, to relish the small comforts of Yixing’s hands and ankles and the slope of his shoulder up to his neck. Yixing’s body is familiar in the simplest of ways, something Wu Fan knows well after years of sharing a room, sometimes sharing a bed, always sharing a life.
"Sure," Yixing says, handing Wu Fan a serving bowl. "You wash, I’ll dry."
Even though Yixing criticizes Wu Fan’s washing technique from start to finish, poking fun at how many places Wu Fan misses-"How could you miss that? Your hands are so big they practically cover the whole thing!"-it still feels a little like home, their laughter filling the kitchen until Lu Han sticks his head into the kitchen and glances between them.
"I’m trying to study," he says in the sweet, soft voice that both Wu Fan and Yixing knows means danger.
Holding one finger up to his lips, Yixing nods seriously. "Sorry," he says. "We’ll keep it down."
"Thank you," Lu Han says, and with one last glance, disappears back towards his bedroom.
Wu Fan and Yixing’s gazes meet over the space between them, and Yixing giggles, one hand pressed to his mouth to keep the sound inside. "Come, come," he says, catching Wu Fan by the wrist and pulling him along to the living room. The couch is empty-no time for relaxation with so few days left-and Yixing pushes Wu Fan down onto the end of it, then sprawls out and puts his head in Wu Fan’s lap. Shameless, like he is only when it’s him and Wu Fan and no one else.
"We’re going to be fine," Yixing says, his eyes closed, mouth curved in a half-smile. Instinctively, Wu Fan’s fingers thread through his hair, winding through the strands. Yixing’s hair is straight now, and brittle with chemicals, but so soft that Wu Fan can’t help himself. "Next week, I mean. Everything is going to be fine."
"How do you know that?" Wu Fan asks.
"Because I know you." Yixing hums in the back of his throat. "So I know we’ll be fine."
From anyone else, that kind of trust might be crippling. From Yixing, it makes Wu Fan’s heart feel lighter, like maybe he can take one more step forward. He doesn’t think too hard about what that means, but the knowledge settles inside his heart anyway, beating in time with his pulse. One, two. One, two.
Yixing falls asleep with his head in Wu Fan’s lap, but Wu Fan barely sleeps at all, too busy watching the rise and fall of Yixing’s chest and asking himself questions he doesn’t know the answers to.
2012/2013
The venue for the Jiangsu New Year’s Eve concert is complicated backstage, with enough flies and hallways that Kris can disappear for a moment to clear his head. It’s not often that he has the luxury of being able to do this before every performance-and he feels blessed whenever he does have the time to sneak away a little and hide behind some supports or a piece of background, eyes closed, breathing even. Remembering, even if just for a moment, that he can let the adrenaline rush his veins without letting it take him over.
"Duizhang." Yixing’s voice. Kris’ heart stops, then starts up again, faster than before. It’s mostly nerves. "Are you hiding from us?"
"I’m hiding from you," Kris says. It’s mostly the truth, which is why it rolls of his tongue so easily. But he says it as a joke, so Yixing doesn’t know which way the balance is weighted. "I should have known that would never work."
Yixing laughs. "Definitely should have known better," he agrees. He rests a hand on Wu Fan’s back, midway down, his palm warm even through the fabric of Wu Fan’s jacket. "Are you okay?"
"I’m fine."
He is fine. He’s in good health. All of his members are in good health. They were invited to Jiangsu for this concert, after all-Kris has no reason to complain.
But still.
"It’s almost the new year," Yixing says. Neither of them are wearing a watch, but Kris believes him. Yixing is always good about things like that. "They’re going to start the countdown soon. I wonder if we’ll be expected to kiss someone when the year changes?"
Kris’ eyes shoot to Yixing’s, but they’re unreadable in the darkness, his expression soft and mysterious and something Kris has never seen before. "That sounds dangerous," he says, and can’t help the way his voice catches and blurs on the last syllable. Can’t help how his desire for Yixing is hot and thick in the back of his throat, the way he can’t quite swallow it down. "How would we know if anyone even wanted to kiss us?"
The smile that curves on Yixing’s lips speaks volumes, worth a thousand words and more, and he reaches up to smooth his palm over the lapel of Kris’ jacket. "Come here, idiot," he says, and then he leans up and kisses Kris on the mouth. It isn’t insistent, isn’t particularly passionate, but it’s soft and sweet and lingering and makes Kris’ lips tingle even when Yixing pulls away.
"Normally," Yixing says, "when someone wants to kiss you, you can tell." His palm is still resting on Kris’ chest, warm, just above his heart. "Except you, Wu Fan. You’re dense."
"Hey," Kris says, laughs, and then they’re kissing again. It lasts maybe a minute, but that minute feels like a lifetime, an aeon-the distance between galaxies, maybe. Plenty long enough for Kris to fall in love.
Maybe he’s been there, already. Maybe he just had to find his way back.
"They’re looking for us," Yixing says, straightening Kris’ collar, then stepping back. "Happy New Year, duizhang."
"Happy New Year," Kris says.
Later, on stage, Yixing’s fingers brush over the inside of Kris’ wrist, nothing more than the softest brush of skin, and Kris smiles and laughs and, for once, doesn’t worry.
2015
For Wu Fan’s birthday, Yixing takes him to a small rooftop garden atop a department store in an entirely different district than their dorm-safer that way, removed from the potential of the prying eyes of fans. It’s a strange and isolated little area, a bamboo garden with warm yellow lights strung through it, grass laid down and a few tables and benches set near a stone pathway. Not something one would expect to find on the top of a department store. Wu Fan wonders how Yixing found a place like this.
“Are you giving me you for my birthday?” he asks, looping an arm around Yixing’s shoulders and pressing a kiss just below his ear.
Yixing squirms and shoves at him, laughing. “No,” he says, his expression soft and thoughtful and sweet when he looks up at Wu Fan. “Just giving you a little peace and quiet. I thought you might need it.”
There are so few times when Wu Fan thinks, Ah, I can take a breath now. Idols aren’t built to breathe. They are built to run and sing and dance and ask “How high?” when someone says “Jump.” Peace and quiet is a concept altogether foreign to Wu Fan in the years since he joined SM Entertainment, and the idea of being given some as a gift-that makes his chest feel light, expansive. “Thank you,” he says, leaning down and pressing his mouth to Yixing’s in a quiet, purposeful kiss. “I love it.”
He and Yixing lie face-up in the grass and look at the absence of stars in the Seoul sky, drowned out by light pollution and air pollution. An airplane flies overhead and Yixing points it out, laughing, names it the North Star, and they both watch its progress until it can no longer be seen.
“It’ll be two years, soon,” Yixing muses aloud, his fingers finding Wu Fan’s and lacing with them. “That’s a long time.”
“Six years that we’ve known each other,” Wu Fan adds. “That’s an even longer time.”
They’re quiet for a long moment. Wu Fan thinks about all of the things he has lost in his life, things he never had a chance to hold onto. All of his relationships had lasted less than a year, and then Wu Fan had cut them off, unwilling to take the risk that one day they would walk away.
“My father left when I was twelve,” Wu Fan says into the silence between them. “I’ve never hated anyone as much as I hated him for that. He was a deadbeat, he drank too much and treated me and my mom like crap, but-he was my father. He owed it to us to stay and he didn’t.”
What he doesn’t say:
You don’t owe it to me to stay, but you do anyway. You have known me at my best and at my absolute worst, and for some reason, you are still here.
What he doesn’t say:
I think that if you stayed with me, I could make it last forever.
Instead, Wu Fan says, “Thanks,” and hopes that Yixing understands all of the layers underneath those words, those two simple syllables that carry so much in their arms.
Yixing squeezes his hand lightly and says, “Of course.”
2018
In April, they tell EXO that they won’t be promoting together anymore as a group.
That isn’t to say that they won’t have careers anymore. The SM representative is very clear on that point. EXO will release one last mini-album in May, and then they’ll have their goodbye concert in June. After that, Baekhyun and Kyungsoo have been signed on to do the soundtrack songs for SM’s latest idol-populated drama, and Jongdae will be releasing a Japanese version of the solo mini he released domestically last August. They tell Kris that he will have a cameo role in the drama that Baekhyun and Kyungsoo are singing for, and they tell Yixing that they want him to assist with dance training and choreography, at least for a little while.
Still, they all know it for the end it is. In the silence following the representative’s words, Kris leans forward, balances his elbows on his knees. Junmyun looks like he’s on the verge of tears, even though they’ve all seen this coming for a while.
"Our visas are only good until the end of the year," Kris says. He means his, and Yixing’s, and Zitao’s, and Lu Han’s. Their visas will expire, and without a company to sponsor them, they will have no place in Korea.
The representative meets Kris’ eyes steadily, and there is sympathy there even if there is none in her tone when she says, "We are aware."
So it goes.
On the last day of April, Wu Fan finds Yixing on the balcony of their dorm, sitting in one of the plastic chairs with his feet propped up on the railing. He would look peaceful, if Wu Fan hadn’t learned to read the tapping of Yixing’s fingers against the chair’s arm just as clearly as he can read words on a page.
He rests his hand on Yixing’s shoulder. “Hey.”
When Yixing looks up at him, his eyes are dark and unfathomable, galaxies. “Hey,” he says, catching Wu Fan’s hand and pressing a kiss to the inside of his palm. It’s quiet and squirmingly intimate, something that Wu Fan wants to tuck away into a corner of his mind and never share.
“Thinking about something?”
“About what I’ll do when we’re done,” Yixing says. For once, the done means more than just promotions and photoshoots and interviews. It means everything, and the weight of that is heavy on Kris’ shoulders.
“They want you to stay as a dance teacher,” Kris reminds Yixing, but that’s the leader voice, and after a moment Wu Fan asks, “What do you want to do?”
Yixing is quiet for a long moment, his eyes searching for something in the lights of the city, and then he says, “I don’t know.”
“That’s okay.” Wu Fan threads his fingers gently through the hair at the nape of Yixing’s neck, thumbs along the curve of his shoulder. “It’s okay not to know.” He doesn’t know, either. Kris pretends to, but there are so many variables, so many uncertainties that it seems impossible to decide.
Yixing tugs at Wu Fan’s wrist until he sits down in the chair with him-on him, really-and then he presses a soft kiss to Wu Fan’s mouth. “I’ll tell you when I do,” he says, sounding like a promise that Wu Fan is all too willing to believe.
“Okay,” Wu Fan says, kissing Yixing’s nose, his eyelids, his forehead. “Me, too.”
They release their mini-album in May, and it does better than anything they’ve released in the last year. "That’s good!" Junmyun says, ever optimistic, when he hears about the digital and physical sales figures. "Isn’t that good?"
"It’s good," Kris agrees, even though he knows they both know it has more to do with nostalgia than anything. Super Junior’s last album had sold the same way-one final blaze of glory before the fire sputtered and went out. It’s not bad, but he doesn’t think he would say it’s good, either.
Junmyun sighs and glances down at his hands, folded carefully together in his lap. “I’m still having a hard time with it,” he admits, vulnerable in a way that he has only ever been with Kris. With someone who understands what it means to be a leader, to carry the weight of five other men on your shoulders.
“I know,” Kris says, nodding. “Me, too.”
Before their concert in June, Yixing kisses Wu Fan softly on the mouth and says, "Thank you." He doesn’t say for what, but Wu Fan feels the weight of it in the touch of Yixing’s hands to his shoulders, the way his eyes trace Wu Fan’s features and the small smile that pulls at his lips.
There are any number of things Kris should say, but instead Wu Fan settles on, "I love you."
When Yixing smiles, there’s a sadness to it that Wu Fan doesn’t know if he can assign to their goodbye concert, their fond farewell to the fans who have supported them all this time. "I know," he says, brushing Wu Fan’s hair off his forehead. "I love you, too."
That night, at the dorm, Wu Fan walks in on Yixing packing his things into his suitcases. "What are you doing?" he asks, even though it’s obvious, and the words come out more like an accusation than anything.
"I’m packing," Yixing says, and even though his voice is soft and placid, there’s a tension in his shoulders that can’t be ignored.
"To go where?"
"I won’t be living in the dorms anymore." Yixing folds a sweater and tucks it into his duffel. Wu Fan recognizes it-it was the sweater he had given to Yixing for the first Valentine’s Day they spent together. It wasn’t all that much, just soft red cotton, its sleeves slightly too long, but Yixing had kissed him and said, "I love it," and so Wu Fan had thought it was all right anyhow.
"Then where?"
"Home."
It takes a moment for Wu Fan to know what Yixing is talking about. For the last six years, this has been home-these dorms, and before them the dorms in Nonhyeon-dong, and before that the trainee dorms where Wu Fan and Yixing had shared a room in the years before they debuted together. But Yixing doesn’t mean this home, anymore. Wu Fan’s fingers tighten on the doorframe, the room tilting a little under his feet.
"Changsha?" he asks, his voice hollow. "I thought they wanted you to work with trainees."
"I declined." Yixing sits back on his knees, but he can’t meet Wu Fan’s eyes. "They were kind in trying to give me something to do before our visas expire, but I would rather go home to my family than be given busywork here." His palms slide over the denim of his jeans, a nervous habit Wu Fan recognizes from every other time that Yixing has been nervous. There have been many. By this time, Wu Fan and Yixing have been together for six years, give or take. The idea of Yixing being anywhere but at Wu Fan’s side makes him want to throw up. "I was going to tell you."
"When?" Why does it seem like all Wu Fan can do is ask questions? "Were you going to call me from the airport and tell me then? ‘By the way, Wu Fan, sorry, but I’m going back to China, see you around’?"
His words are cruel and his tone biting, but Yixing accepts it the way he has accepted every raw and weak and frightened part of Wu Fan. It’s a learned cruelty, taught to Wu Fan by all of the many people who have walked away from him over the course of his life. "Tomorrow," he says. "I was going to tell you tomorrow."
"And when is your flight?"
Yixing's fingers clench into fists. "Tomorrow."
Wu Fan expects it to hit him like a freight train, but instead it just slides down his spine, the knowledge cold and leaving goosebumps in its wake. "So that's how it's going to be," he says. "Five and a half years and you were going to walk away from me just like that."
"I wasn't going to walk away-" Yixing begins, but Wu Fan isn't listening, the white noise in his head too loud for words to make it through.
"You could have told me in April, when they told us that we were done," Wu Fan says, feeling off-center, like each of his words is being torn from him. "Or when we went on that weekend trip in May just before our mini dropped. Or maybe even when I fucking asked you what you were going to do after our concert, Yixing-"
"Wu Fan," Yixing says, and his voice is so small and soft that it draws Wu Fan up short for a minute. “I’m sorry.”
The apology should be enough. Wu Fan wants it to be enough.
“I didn’t know how to tell you,” Yixing says, looking at Wu Fan’s feet. As though that would be enough to conceal the way his shoulders tremble, the way his hands are fisted in his lap so tightly Wu Fan imagines the nails cutting into Yixing’s palms. “I didn’t know how to ask you-how could I ask you? To give everything up and come with me to Changsha? I could never ask you to do that. I never wanted to walk away from you-”
Wu Fan speaks, before he can stop himself, and he knows his words are cruel, but these words are words that cannot be stopped by the dam he’s trying to build in his throat. He is terrified. “Everyone walks away from me eventually,” he says, his voice soft. He can’t even be angry, anymore. “I guess I was stupid for thinking this would be different.”
He watches the way Yixing’s eyes go liquid, the way his whole body shudders. Wu Fan thinks, I will regret this for the rest of my life.
Yixing doesn’t say anything more. He folds the remainder of his clothing into his suitcase and closes it, tucks the last of his personal belongings into a box addressed to his home in Changsha. Wu Fan wonders who will send it. Probably Lu Han. He wonders if Lu Han knew, already, and didn’t tell him, out of fear or worry or some other misplaced emotion that kept Wu Fan in the dark all this time.
When Yixing starts to walk away, Wu Fan catches his wrist.
“Is this it?” he asks.
Yixing looks up at him with an expression that says all of the things Yixing cannot find a voice to speak.
"Fine," Wu Fan says. It isn’t fine, but he lets go of Yixing’s wrist anyway, because Wu Fan is not his keeper, not his jailer. Just his lover, but those come and go. "Then you just call me if you need me."
Yixing walks away. He doesn’t call for a long, long time.
2019
He gets the phone call in April.
Wu Fan meets Yixing in the lobby of a hotel in Beijing, where the floors are shined so brightly they’re impervious to footprints, and the top of the bar is carved from black marble as dark as night. A year can change a lot of things, but like always, Wu Fan steps into the room and his eyes go immediately to Yixing’s back-there are many things Wu Fan has already forgotten about the time they spent as EXO, but the way Yixing carries himself is not one of them.
Likely as not, it will never be one of them.
He slips into the empty seat next to Yixing and braces his elbows on the marble. Yixing’s hair is a little longer now, layered into his eyes, and several shades darker than it had been the last time Wu Fan saw him. He’s wearing a suit. He looks good-healthy, his cheekbones a little less pronounced.
"Long time no see," Wu Fan says. It’s a lame opener, but they have to start somewhere.
Yixing curls his fingers around the shape of his glass-he’s always had such small hands-and looks over at Wu Fan with a gaze that’s at once affectionate and curiously closed. "No kidding," he says, his dimple sinking into his cheek when he smiles. "About a year, right?"
As though Wu Fan hasn’t been counting the days. As though he doesn’t have a mental calendar that checks off every month that passes since the last words he and Yixing exchanged.
"That sounds right," he says. "I was surprised to hear from you. You’ve been busy these days, haven’t you?"
Yixing shrugs a little. Wu Fan remembers that too-how Yixing always wanted to downplay his own achievements. Like two solo albums and an Asia tour are no big deal. "I’m taking a break right now, though," he says, "between winter promotions and the album release scheduled for July. I thought it would be nice to get back in touch."
"Have you talked to any of the others?"
From the corner of his eye Wu Fan watches the way Yixing’s smile curves, a little shy, as he looks down at his drink. "No," he admits. "I talk to Zitao sometimes. He’s studying wushu now... Minseok has a spot as a host on that China-Korea friendship variety show, you know the one. I think it’s in Jiangsu."
That made sense. Minseok, while his Mandarin had never become fluent, had the kind of personality that was good for variety. Once he had learned to stop being shy about his pronunciation mistakes, that is. "That’s good," Wu Fan says. He wishes he had been brave enough to reach out, to keep better tabs on the boys-now men-who had once been his responsibility. "But then-"
"Mm?"
"Why me?"
Yixing puffs out his cheeks, shrugs, and then looks up at Wu Fan. "Why not?"
There are a million reasons why not, and Wu Fan is sure that Yixing can see all of them reflected in his eyes. He raises an eyebrow, and Yixing makes a rueful face and nods. "Fair enough," he says, rolling his glass between his palms. It’s left a wet ring on the black marble of the bartop. "I just..."
A year can change a lot. Wu Fan waits, quiet, for Yixing to speak.
"I miss you," Yixing finally says, and the words-quiet and gentle-sink their way into Wu Fan’s heart and lodge there. "I know I messed it up a lot. We both were pretty stupid, I think. But-" He looks at Wu Fan’s hands, unable to meet his eyes. "I know it’s not going to be like it was, but I would like to be friends, Wu Fan."
Wu Fan thinks about it, about all of the things they had said to each other that last night in Seoul before Yixing boarded a plane back to Changsha. How cruel they had been to each other, and how much of it he now knows was born not of anger, but of a need to protect themselves. Stupid boys and their stupid words, and now, a year later, Wu Fan can’t find a single word to say. He wonders if Yixing wants to say as much to him as Wu Fan wants to say to Yixing. If there are as many words heavy on the tip of his tongue, tucked into his cheeks like secrets.
"I," he says, and then his voice fails.
Yixing lifts his glass and swallows the last sip of his drink, then sets it down again, right in the ring of condensation left on the marble. "Okay." He reaches into his jacket and withdraws a keycard, which he places gently to the right of his glass, next to Wu Fan’s hand. "I’m in 2201," he says, offering Wu Fan a small smile. "If you change your mind."
For a moment, something about this scenario gives Wu Fan such a strong sense of deja vu that the world tilts around him. Yixing, walking away. The line of Yixing’s shoulders, defeated, as he doesn’t look back. A year ago, Wu Fan had waited-hoped-that Yixing would look back, but now-just like then-his eyes stay forward, and he walks away.
The card sits next to his hand, white against the black bartop. Wu Fan looks at it, and wonders if he would ever forgive himself for not taking the hand that Yixing has offered.
No, he thinks. Probably not.
The elevator ride to the twenty-second floor takes an eternity, and Wu Fan is a new man by the time he steps out into the carpeted hallway. The keycard feels heavy in his hand, its weight a promise, and when he stops in front of Yixing’s door he asks himself if it’s a promise he’s willing to make. Or, more importantly-if it’s a promise he’s willing to keep.
He slides the keycard into the lock, listens as tumblers disengage and electric parts buzz. From inside, Yixing’s voice says, "Come in."
Wu Fan takes a deep breath and pushes the door open.
note: This is truthfully a little silly and not as well-developed as I would have liked for it to be, but I think it's time for me to be done with it. ♥ And of course, this should go without saying, but please do not take anything in this story as factual-it is, after all, merely fanfiction.