Love You Blindly (part 2)

[reebeegee]

(part 1)

Kyungsoo isn’t sure why Joonmyun chooses this specific café over all the others they frequent. It’s the most expensive, with ridiculously priced specialty drinks and slices of cake that make you whimper at them with need just by looking at them behind the glass, thick layers of mouse, berries, and whipped cream. Rows of colorful macaroons and sugar coated cookies. Everything a few more dollars than it really should be.

“You’ve always wanted to get something here.” Joonmyun smiles when Kyungsoo protests. They could always just go to an ordinary Starbucks for coffee for what seems like half the price.

“Always wanted to, but look why we never did.” Kyungsoo scowls and points at a seven-dollar slice of cake, granted it’s rather scrumptious looking with chocolate ganache and raspberries. Is that real gold foil flecks dusted on top? His mouth waters and his stomach gurgles, but his conscious betrays him. This is too expensive even if Joonmyun’s trying to make him cheer up.

“If it makes you feel better, we can just get it to go and I’ll immediately trash the receipt and you won’t have to sit in here and look at the prices,” Joonmyun notes. “Just once, Kyungsoo. We can afford to do it once before we leave. We’ll probably never come back here again.”

Kyungsoo eyes him skeptically. He has a point, and it makes Kyungsoo’s heart sink. He’s still not quite over the fact that this place, along with many others, will be a part of his history and no longer a part of his future.

“Okay,” he concedes. “But let’s try to keep it under twenty dollars if we can.” He hopes it’s possible, but at the same time he wants to eat everything behind that thin panel of glass. Maybe they should just skip the coffee and go for the sweets.

“Whatever you want.” Joonmyun grins reassuringly and leans in to press a kiss to Kyungsoo’s cheek.

Kyungsoo squawks and pushes Joonmyun away. He’s not entirely opposed to PDA, but he knows there’s probably someone in this café that won’t like what they see, and Kyungsoo has always been the self-conscious sort.

Joonmyun chuckles when he sees Kyungsoo’s cheeks have turned a soft shade of pink. “Just pick anything and order it to go. Here, take my card. I’m going to go to the restroom. And don’t look at the price,” Joonmyun beams while walked away from a highly embarrassed Kyungsoo.

“It’s impossible not to,” Kyungsoo snorts as he turns to face the deathtrap of pastries in front of him. Maybe they’ll go for simple coffees to make up for the extra cost of cake.

* * *

Jongin isn’t sure how Luhan has managed to convince him and Sehun to show up at the café he works at during his break, but somehow both of them have agreed. Something about wanting to be in a friendly public atmosphere so that things would be forced to stay relatively controlled, unless the two of them felt inclined to socially embarrass themselves, and Luhan himself, in front of the unsuspecting customers. Jongin had rolled his eyes at that, but Luhan fortunately couldn’t see since this was all over a three-way phone call.

“Look, now I’m sacrificing my phone bill and my work for the two of you,” Luhan had said glumly. Neither Jongin nor Sehun cared to respond, aside from reluctantly agreeing to meet up.

So, that is how Jongin finds himself standing outside of L’île Flottante, staring grumpily through window at where Sehun and Luhan were calmly sitting. No doubt Luhan is on at least his fifth cup of coffee today while Sehun is nibbling on a cookie, crumbs sticking to the cracks between his lips. They look cute together, Jongin observes. Bubbly Luhan making wild hand gestures as he prattles on about something apparently funny, because he can see Sehun’s little cookie crumb coated smile cracking between his lips. It takes a lot to make Sehun smile, especially when he’s in a bad mood, and Jongin doesn’t doubt that he currently is.

“Why couldn’t you love him?” Jongin murmurs to no one in particular. The people walking by on the street don’t hear him and he doubts the wind has ears. Wind is only good at whipping your words away from you and depositing them in little ditches of earth and between the leaves on trees. Words are useless when there’s no one there to hear them.

* * *

In the middle of laughing at something Luhan says about teacup poodles and how his coworker, Tao, wants to carry one around in a purse, Sehun shifts his gaze towards the window and catches sight of Jongin standing outside watching them. He going to bolt, Sehun thinks and then frowns. Jongin stares back at him, grimaces and twitches his fingers nervously, running them up and down the denim of what appears to be Sehun’s jeans. The bastard’s going to bolt and he’s wearing my clothes. Not that Sehun’s any better since he’s still wearing Jongin’s.

“Is he wearing those out of sympathy, because he actually gives a shit about me, or is that just to piss me off?” Sehun mutters. He’s a little past the I’m Exceedingly Depressed and Need to Sob phase and is now edging on anger and guilt, the I Really Want to Punch That Asshole In the Face phase.

“Don’t get your hopes up, Sehun. He probably doesn’t even realize that those are your jeans. You’ve seen his room….” Luhan sighs and turns to join Sehun in the act of staring down a very decrepit looking Jongin.

“He looks pitiful.”

“He does,” Luhan agrees and turns to face Sehun. “You look pissed.” He raises an eyebrow and takes a sip of his coffee, which is unfortunately getting a little cold.

When they first met, Luhan could hardly decipher any of Sehun’s bland facial expressions. He just looked perpetually bored, out of place, and disinterested. Maybe even a little aloof. But Luhan’s learned his lesson now. After a few hours of Jongin flipping through old photo books and pointing out the little twists and eye glimmers that made up smiles and frowns, or the faint wrinkles of a furrowed brow that meant he was angry. Jongin had even gone as far as to ask Sehun to demonstrate for Luhan which then led to an epically horrible attempt at playing charades in which both Jongin and Luhan failed to guess everything Sehun attempted to act out. Sehun’s lack of animated facial expressions certainly did not make for good acting.

“I am pissed,” Sehun grumbles and pokes out his tongue. The tongue poking, Luhan has noted over the years, usually has to do with a general dislike for the current situations that he’s in. Sometimes it displays anger, or disgust, or frustration. Hardly is it ever for enjoyment.

“As you should be,” Luhan chuckles, “But you two should really work this out. I know it really sucks, but I can promise you it will be worth it in the end. It’s what I should have done instead of losing Yixing. And Jongin’s an immature ass anyways, so I don’t think it’ll be that much of a loss just being friends with him. Imagine how much you’d have to baby him if you were really together. I already have to baby him and all I do is live with him,” he snorts.

“And who do you think taught you how to take care of him, Luhan?” He spits out and takes a sip of the tea that Luhan insisted he order. Apparently Tao makes excellent tea, though Sehun doubts it takes that much effort when all Tao really had to do was give him a cup of hot water and a tea bag of his choosing. The hardest part was probably waiting for the water to boil and finding the little packets of honey that they’d almost run out of.

“You.”

“Exactly.”

“So, we’ll figure this out. We’ll make sense of this, and maybe things won’t be exactly as they were before, but they’ll be okay. You’re young, you’ve got plenty other opportunities in your life to meet someone better than him, but that doesn’t mean you have to drop all contact. We’ll figure this out Sehun, I promise.”

“You better be right, because he might actually come inside instead of continue to stand out there like a dork,” Sehun snorts.

“He’s still a dork even if he comes inside, to be honest.” Luhan smiles. There’s never a day that goes by that Jongin does not make a fool of himself, only today he’s made himself far worse than a fool. Far filthier than an idiot. And yet Luhan still hopes that he can patch things back together.

* * *

The man behind the counter with puffy eyes, jet-black hair, and a bedazzled black and gold nametag that proudly reads HUANG ZITAO in all capitals with a scribbled on Master of Cake in loopy almost indiscernible writing, is the fortunate fellow that helps Kyungsoo pick out the cakes.

“Oh, and you should really try this one. The mango mouse is to die for and the passionfru-”

“Tao, I don’t think we need four slices of cake. There’s only two of us,” Kyungsoo says politely though he’s feeling rather snappish.

“If not cake, then how about a macaroon? Blackcurrant is my favorite, but chocolate is equally delicious. Oh, maybe try a green tea one? That’s our newest flavor!” He beams and Kyungsoo feels like crumpling into a ball at the bottom of Joonmyun’s soon to be empty bank account if Tao has his way.

“Nope.”

“Hmm, not a macaroon guy?” Tao winks, though Kyungsoo is not sure what warrants the winking. Are macaroons now innuendos for something else? “What about a croissant? Savory or sweet? Plain? Chocolate? Spinach and cheese? Ooh, this one has tomatoes and onions!”

“No, Tao, really. The cake is plenty. I haven’t even ordered coffees yet,” he says sheepishly.

“What about scones?” Tao presses.

“Tao, stop intimidating the customers,” a giant man snaps, thick eyebrows furrowed in disapproval. Under his name, KRIS (Kyungsoo finds rather funny because he’s never seen it spelled like that before), there is a very official title claiming that he is the floor manager. Unlike Tao’s, Kyungsoo notes, the words are not scribbled on in handwriting and are instead embossed officially onto the nametag in the same gold print.

“Sorry,” Tao pouts and shoots a glare at the intimidating fellow, but when he turns his attention back to Kyungsoo he immediately brightens his face again. “So, coffee you say? We’re trying out new spring flavors. There’s this one roast, from Chile I think, that has a hint of orange to it. Oh, and iced mocha’s are always popular when the weather starts to warm up. If you want it hot, we can even serve it in a recyclable paper cup with tulips since you want it to go, being spring-y and all. Flowers blossoming. Leaves budding. It’s a good time of year for trying something new.”

“How about something simple?” Kyungsoo sighs. Nothing stops this kid. He almost wishes he were dealing with scary eye-browed Kris than over enthusiastic Master of Cake Zitao.

“Iced Americano’s are a classic this time of year, or do you prefer lattes? Maybe a shot of vanilla syrup?”

“Two iced Americanos will be just fine, thank you.” They can always put in their own sugar if they want, because he bets all the extra flavorings will do nothing but raise the cost, and Tao’s already convinced him to get three mini cakes.

“Okay, which roast would you like? The new one from Chile or-”

“Whichever’s cheapest,” Kyungsoo finally snaps and prays that Joonmyun returns soon because he’s positive that Joonmyun is the only one that can stop him from leaping across the counter and killing L’île Flottante’s supposed Cake Master. Unless Kris is quick enough to interject, but by the annoyed look on his face he’s almost certain that Kris wouldn’t be opposed to his coworker getting strangled to death.

* * *

Eventually, after his awkward stare down with Sehun and Luhan, Jongin works up the courage to enter the café and join them. By the way Sehun keeps glancing at his thighs as he sits down in the seat they’ve been saving for him, he’s pretty sure that something’s wrong with his pants. Maybe there’s a giant gaping hole in them that he’s neglected to notice or a giant stain or, oh shit, maybe they’re Oh Sehun’s. No wonder they didn’t exactly fit right.

“I’m sorry. You’re pants…” Jongin blurts out awkwardly.

“Yes, mine,” Sehun sneers.

“Please children, let’s be civil,” Luhan giggles nervously. “I mean you’re wearing his, Sehun. You two have worn each other’s clothes before, if I recall correctly.”

“Right, but Jongin didn’t sleep with me first those times. And, since I’m so lacking, I didn’t think he’d want to wear my pants. Walking around in nothing but his undies would probably feel more satisfying than my clothing.”

“I’m sorry, okay?” Jongin murmurs.

“Sorry you had sex with me or sorry you’re wearing my pants?” Sehun hisses.

Jongin shifts uncomfortably in his seat, completely unsure of how to carry himself in the current situation. His eyes beg Luhan for help, but he knows he probably won’t get much, so he tries to answer as best as he can. “Both?”

“Fuck you, Jongin,” Sehun growls bitterly and clenches his fist so tight that his nails dig into his skin. Jongin jumps a little in his seat, flinching at the loudness of Sehun’s voice as it vibrates through him. A few people in the café turn to give them odd looks, but don’t linger on them too long.

Luhan reaches out a hand across the table and soothingly rubs his thumb across Sehun’s wrist and untangles his fingers from clenching into a fist. “Calm down, you’re going to cause a scene and then I’m going to get fired. You’re lucky Kris is distracted by Tao being a prat to one of the customers or it’d be off with my head,” he chuckles.

“When is he not being one?” Jongin scoffs and glances over at Tao trying to sucker one of the customers into buying a lifetime’s worth of cake no doubt. He’d much rather watch Tao con unsuspecting customers into sweet related debt than continue his conversation with his friend, especially since Sehun looks like he’d like to claw his eyes out and slit his jugular. They have to talk though, apparently, so he knows he shouldn’t. Luhan will surely do more than scold him if he doesn’t do something this time, and he’ll probably lose Sehun forever, but he has a hard time pulling his eyes away from the squabble over at the pastry counter.

There’s something strange about the boy Tao’s currently trying to sell cakes to, something that makes him not want to look away. He doesn’t look that special though, at least not from behind. Short dark hair, simple clothes, pale skin. Normal. Hardly tall or special in any way. But it’s not the looks that get to Jongin, it’s the little tingling feeling in his gut that begs for the boy to look at him, to turn away from insufferable Huang Zitao and look only at Jongin. He wants to see if there’s anything about that face that mirrors his own, maybe the same lack of happiness in his eyes or the same crease of his brow or wrinkles when he smiles that scream “I’m not happy and I never will be.”

Turn around, Jongin thinks and stares at the back of the unknown man’s head with pleading eyes.

“Jongin, are you paying attention?”

“Hmm?”

“You two are supposed to be talking this out, remember?” Luhan grumbles and takes a sip of coffee. “What are you even looking at you pigeon head?”

Jongin rips his gaze away from Tao’s unfortunate customer and glances over at a very petulant Sehun and annoyed Luhan. “Nothing, sorry. You know I’m spacy sometimes.”

“Yeah, like when you want to avoid things,” Sehun points out.

“I’m not very good with reality,” he admits.

“No one is. But you can’t be a baby forever. You’re twenty-one too, Jongin. You shouldn’t need a baby sitter and you should know better than to sleep with someone that’s been pretty obviously in love with you for years.”

“But-”

“But you’re Jongin, and you space out, and you ignore reality, and you ignore me even though we’re supposedly best friends. And it hurts.”

Jongin spends the next few minutes, though they feel like hours, being lectured about “growing up” and “knowing your limits” and all these other “adult” things that he’s been misinformed about when it comes to “growing up”. Sometimes it’s Sehun talking, but most of the time it’s Luhan saying this or that.

He knows he’s stupid, he knows he’s done wrong but they don’t know what it’s like to be him. They don’t understand that it’s hard to face reality when reality is so empty. Neither of them knows what it’s like to be so profoundly unsatisfied with your life and your surroundings, and even your best friends, that it eats away at your brain until there’s nothing left but the unending desire to seek out the tiny little fraction of yourself in some corner of the world. You become consumed with the idea of becoming whole. Every touch and every word is weightless when you’re consumed by emptiness and Jongin wants so much for his life to feel meaningful.

Sehun, despite being broken hearted, can feel things. The ache of a crunching heart and a throbbing mind and a body so full of emotion that it could burst at the seams. But when Jongin looks at the world, all he feels is empty and it’s not something that hurts him physically, but mentally.

Even if he can reach out and tug at warm skin and bones until he’s sure that the people around him are real, he’s not emotionally satisfied, and it’s the emotional, and that’s what hurts most. It’s that hungry gnawing in his stomach and the little twitch in his brain that says he’s missing the most important part of his life. It’s the feeling. That’s what counts. Not the weight of life, but the meaning of it. It’s hard to always feel hungry for something that isn’t there, and to pretend that he can fill his emotional stomach with the presence of someone else. But substitutes are insubstantial, otherwise why would they be called substitutes? If they were good enough, they wouldn’t need replacements.

It’s in the midst of the lecturing that Jongin finally catches sight of the Unfortunate Customer’s face, soft with thick eyebrows and awkwardly heart shaped lips. Perhaps a little ticked off that he has to deal with annoying Zitao. He’s not so ordinary looking anymore. In fact, Jongin thinks he’s rather gorgeous in an awkward sort of way. There’s a very slight bump in the center of his nose, almost unnoticeable, and cute little mole behind his left ear that gives Jongin the oddest desire to sprint across the room and kiss it. His hair is a nice chocolaty brown that’s neatly styled. Jongin’s finger itch to run through every follicle, tug him closer so he can inhale and determine if he smells just as good as Jongin thinks he looks.

By this point, Luhan’s soft words are lost on him. All he wants to do is walk up to that man and introduce himself. Hello, I’m Jongin. I’ve been looking for you and I think you’ve been looking for me too.

Every inch of him itches to be noticed. Look at me, look at me, look at me. He watches his lips seem to twitch from grimace of annoyance to mild confusion while Tao is off making his drink order, and it sparks a little flicker of hope in him. Maybe he’s feeling this too?

Jongin’s eyes beg for him to turn around and he almost does, but then Tao is back with his drinks and his box of cakes and already he’s is distracted once again, no doubt by the ridiculous price of his purchase as Tao rings him up.

“Fuck, just look at me,” Jongin whispers.

“What?” Luhan and Sehun question in unison, eyes staring wide and unblinking at him.

“Nothing. Just, I agree with what you’re saying. I’m an idiot. Go on.” Truthfully, Jongin lost track of this conversation ages ago. They could be talking about the injustice of lab rats and their short-lived lives as test subjects and Jongin would be none the wiser.

“You’re not listening again!”

He doesn’t know who says it, but he can tell they’re annoyed, only he doesn’t care. Tao is done ringing up Unfortunate Customer so maybe, any second now, he’ll turn this way. Jongin can already picture it in his head. The slow turn of his head as he tucks the crinkled receipt into his pockets unpleasantly. He imagines the inaudible sigh and the formation of confusion on his face once again as the strange feeling returns in his gut.

Jongin wants to scream at him to hurry up because he’s just so sick of feeling empty, guilty, alone, and just plain wrong. But Luhan and Sehun are getting annoyed and he knows he’ll have to look away soon. Turn his attention back to this “reality” of his and learn to “grow up” like everyone wants him too. Doing that might mean remaining empty forever though, so he keeps his eyes focused and ignores Sehun’s bubbling anger and waits, pretending that he knows exactly what his two friends are talking about. Except now Luhan’s tugging on the bronze skin of his elbow saying, “Pay attention, Jongin”.

Unfortunate Customer turns then, after pocketing the receipt just as Jongin imagined, eyes popping open wide and scanning the expanse of the café.

Find me.

And he does.

When they first catch each other’s eyes Jongin nearly sighs with contentment. It’s not that eye contact makes the world shift around him. Everything is essentially the same. Nothing momentous occurs. There’s no ripple in time or magical glow. The world doesn’t stop while their eyes lock and Jongin breathes in the phantom scent of this person, this missing part of himself, with the same lost eyes that reflect the desire Jongin has in his own.

The café continues to hum with lively customers around them, only now the world feels different. Feels heavier. Less intangible and oh so delicious, like a shiny red apple that Jongin’s dying to sink his teeth into and let the juice squish past the edges of his lips and dribbles down his chin. Without thinking, Jongin begins to smile, lips slowly twisting upwards revealing a faint sliver of white teeth. Is this what satisfaction feels like? No, this is just a taste, but he wants more.

“What could you possibly be smiling about?”

Is that Luhan, maybe? He’s not sure. He’s still not paying attention, too focused on blush forming on the other man’s cheeks that seems to turn a deeper shade of pink with every increasing second that they stare at each other. It’s cute.

“Are you kidding me?”

That’s definitely Sehun. Jongin can tell because he says it loud enough that probably everyone in this café can hear him. It’s brash enough to make him snap his eyes away from the stranger, instantly losing his feeling of satisfaction, and stare at Sehun instead. But Sehun isn’t looking at him, or Luhan for that matter. He’s staring back at the blushing Unfortunate Customer.

“What?” Jongin protests as Luhan shakes his head disdainfully.

“Jongin, you’re not seriously-Are you checking him out? Right in front of me? The fuck, Jongin? I’m trying to be civil and fix this, but you’re already eye-fucking someone else.”

Jongin frowns in protest and tries to bullshit his way back into Sehun’s favor. “I’m not checking him out okay. I’m sorry. It’s just I th-”

It doesn’t work because Sehun cuts him off.

“Look, Jongin, it’s one thing for you to just kindly tell me that you don’t like me but want to remain friends, which you haven’t done by the way, and another to just start checking out someone else right in front of me. No one’s satisfying for you, right? So why even bother,” Sehun snarls.

“Because it’s not like that, you asshole,” Jongin hisses. “You don’t know what it’s like being me. You don’t know how fucked up this empty feeling is and you should just stop being a big ass baby just because you aren’t the part of me that I’m searching for. Get over it.”

Luhan watches them warily, like they’re two angry cats with rabies, and mentally wishes he’d taken some psychology courses in college so he knew how to deal with his two hissy friends. Unfortunately, it doesn’t help that Luhan has always been afraid of cats and people when they act like them, which is why he tends to find Tao frightening.

“I’m the asshole? I’m the baby? Wow, okay. Goodbye Jongin. I’m done with you; I think I’ll date Luhan from now on.”

“Wait, what?” Luhan splutters, but hardly gets a chance for clarification before Sehun’s leaning over and pressing an angry kiss on his lips, too quick for him to properly register.

It’s by no means a nice kiss. Sehun’s lips are slightly chapped and, despite brushing his teeth and showering, Luhan can smell and taste the lingering layer of last night’s fiasco on him along with the cookie he’s recently consumed. He doesn’t want to imagine what his face looks like, wide eyes, cheeks furiously flushing in embarrassment because this is not what he expected to have happen. He means to question Sehun, to push him away with a stifled yelp and demand he explain himself, but Sehun has already beat him to the punch, quickly detaching their lips, snatching his jacket off of his chair, and sprinting out of the café with an angry huff.

“I-I’m…I’m confused,” Luhan whimpers. This is now how things should have happened. He was supposed to be here to mediate this situation, not spin himself deeper into the circle of despair. Desperately he hopes that this is all a joke, that Sehun doesn’t really mean he’s going to date him now, because he’s never thought of dating Sehun, at least not since he found out how much he was in love with Jongin, and there’s not way in hell he wants to be Sehun’s rebound. That just seems wrong.

Jongin swallows awkwardly and stares across the table at Luhan’s lips, unsure of how to react to this sudden change in events. Baby Jongin doesn’t know what to do in these situations. For one thing, he’s still dying to waltz up to Unfortunate Customer and kiss the living daylights out of him, but the other part of him is completely thrown off by Sehun’s behavior and Luhan’s shock. Should he console his flummoxed friend that’s showered him with adoration and tolerated him for years, or should he risk it all and bound across the café for the slight chance that he’s finally found that little part of himself in someone else? Make new friends but keep the old, or so they say; only Jongin’s pretty sure that if he leaves now he’s definitely not going to be able to keep the old. His relationship with Sehun might be irreparable and he’d rather not lose Luhan too.

“What were you… What are you thinking Jongin?”

He blinks a few times to refocus his vision when Luhan’s voice sucks him out of his thoughts. “About Sehun kissing you or about the person I was staring at?” he asks meekly.

“Either, I suppose,” Luhan sighs. The blush has still not completely faded from his cheeks.

“I don’t know what I think about Sehun, but… but I think that’s him, Luhan. I know it. I can feel it for once,” he whispers and nods towards the stranger who’s now staring down at his two iced coffees and box of cakes with embarrassment, no doubt having witnessed the whole thing.

Luhan expression turns unreadable as he studies Jongin for a few seconds before turning around to face the man.

Jongin can almost taste his displeasure in Luhan’s exhaled breath as he hunches his shoulders and turns. He doesn’t want to imagine what Luhan might be thinking, because if this person really is who he’s been looking for, then things with Sehun will be even harder to smooth over. His mind grinds to a halt and heart falters when another man with an angelic face appears next to Jongin’s dream man, flashing a wide smile of adoration with bright teeth and love in his eyes.

“Oh….” Luhan whispers, and his face falls in pity because he can see it too. He’s well accustomed to the look of a lovesick human being.

“No… no that’s… that’s not right. I could swear… I could swear he felt it too. He’s like me, Luhan. He has the same look in his eyes. This isn’t right. That’s not right.” Jongin stiffens and clenches his fist under the table, pressing his balled up hands against Sehun’s scratchy jeans. So this is whom he’s been waiting for, but he’s not for Jongin. He’s already found someone else, found a way to live with this feeling empty.

Jongin watches with horror as Angelic Man wrap his arm around the waist of his lover and playfully brush his fingers through his hair before grabbing one of the coffees and taking a sip. With each gesture and smile Jongin feels the puncture wounds in his heart return tenfold. Ten for the way it makes Unfortunate Customer smile. Ten more the way the way they look at each other with infatuated eyes, even if Unfortunate Customer’s still have the empty glint. Another ten for when they link their fingers together, the stranger smoothing his thumb across Angelic Man’s knuckles, and walk out of the café.

To Jongin’s despair, the man avoids all eye contact with him as they walk out of café, and it makes his heart beat uncomfortable in his chest. The luscious apple flavored appeal of reality slithers out of him, leaving him empty once again. Now he feels like less than nothing if he was ever something before.

How many minutes has he been waiting just for this? he repeats to himself for the second time today, wanting to recount every second from the first moment he ever acknowledged there has been something deeply wrong with him, but it’s been years. Years and years and years wasted just for this.

“I’m sorry Jongin.”

“No, this isn’t right. I refuse to let this be right. I know it’s him. He knows it too. He’ll come back,” he insists helplessly. “He’ll have to come back. I’ve been searching forever for this. He has to come back.”

“You don’t know that,” Luhan murmurs, but he knows that now isn’t the time to argue. Instead, he lets Jongin sit there all day, sipping on tea, coffee and ice water until the sun dips so low in the sky that stars come out between the cracks in the clouds and the moon shines through the slimming slivers of uncovered sky. He keeps an eye on Jongin for his entire shift and watches him wait until the moon disappears behind the fog and spring rain soaks the city, tinting the sky with a cloudy purple hue. Luhan drags him out of the café at closing time.

“Let’s go home Jongin. You can come back tomorrow. Come on, you’ve got class at eight.” But Jongin resists, so Luhan tugs on his sleeves, pulling him up and out of his chair, and doesn’t let go of him until they’re back at their apartment and he’s safely tucked Jongin into bed.

“Tomorrow,” Luhan insists when Jongin tries to get up a few hours later, eager to roam the streets searching for his missing piece. “We can fix this tomorrow,” he promises except that even to him he feels like that’s a lie.

º º º º

A month goes by too fast when you’re distracted, confused, and bogged down with schoolwork, Kyungsoo concludes two days before graduating. So much to do, so little time, and he’s still never properly digested the occurrence at L’île Flottante. He spends his afternoon after his last final bubble-wrapping plates and bowls, trying not to let his mind wander back to the boy he’s been thinking about for weeks with lost dark eyes, and a slightly crooked nose.

There’s Joonmyun he reminds himself. And you don’t even know what that weird feeling was or who that kid is.

Except he does know, or at least he thinks he knows. But it was only a moment, for a tiny fraction of his lifetime when their eyes met and maybe, maybe he had finally found what he’d been looking for. He’d never felt so full before, but then the boy was pulled into an argument and Joonmyun returned and suddenly it all felt wrong. The little flutter of desire in his stomach to abandon Joonmyun for the unknown boy vanished, leaving a nice big gap for the guilt to settle into.

He looks at the cardboard boxes, wrapped in thick layers of duct tape, holding precious bits and pieces of his partial life, and wonders if maybe he shouldn’t have agreed to move. Maybe that little bit of himself that he’s been looking for is somewhere in this city, somewhere in that boy with the dark eyes, tan skin, and full lips. Maybe moving is wrong. He should leave now, run back to L’île Flottante in the hopes that the boy with lost eyes has been desperate too, and he’ll be waiting there, even after a month of no-shows, just for Kyungsoo to return to him.

But maybe that’s also just a fool’s hope.

Kyungsoo sighs and frustratingly starts to pop the bubble wrap with vigor. Venting his frustration and confusion on plastic bubbles is better than nothing.

“You’re supposed to protect the coffee mugs with it, Kyungsoo, not destroy it,” Joonmyun laughs when he enters the apartment to see an entire sheet of bubble wrap that has been thoroughly popped.

“Sorry,” Kyungsoo grins impishly and resumes the task of dutifully packaging their dining set.

“It’s okay,” Joonmyun smiles, and Kyungsoo feels like melting away. It’s always okay, no matter what Kyungsoo seems to do, and sometimes that’s frustrating, but other times its achingly sweet. One moment he wants to yell at him for being so accepting and the next he wants to smother him with kisses.

“I’ll buy us some more after my last final tomorrow.”

“We probably have extra, so don’t worry. Here, let me help you. I’m an excellent wrapper,” he says and starts grabbing at the dishes Kyungsoo has stacked neatly in front of himself.

Kyungsoo rolls his eyes and tries to steal the plate out of Joonmyun’s hands. “You’re dreadful at wrapping things. Don’t you remember what you tried to do for my birthday gift this year? Absolute rubbish, I could tell exactly what it was, might as well have wrapped it in a single layer of plastic wrap or not at all.”

“Okay, I admit I didn’t try hard with that one, but for Christmas I did a decent job.”

“For Christmas I couldn’t even find where one piece of tape ended and the other began. Did you even use wrapping paper?” Kyungsoo huffs. When it comes to wrapping, Joonmyun apparently only knows two extremes, not enough and way too much.

“That’s part of the fun,” he chortles and snatches the plate away. “It’ll make the unpacking process even more exciting.”

“Joonmyun!” Kyungsoo pouts and latches onto the plate, but Joonmyun doesn’t lighten his grip.

“Don’t do it. Don’t give me that face,” he warns and yanks harshly on the plate, though it’s not enough to dislodge it from Kyungsoo’s hands.

“What face?”

“The one where you look so petulant I just want to squish you.”

“How is petulance squishy? This is not a squishy face. This a firm expression of disappointment.”

“When you pout your cheeks look rounder. Roundness is squishy therefore petulance is squishy. Shall I prove it to you?” Joonmyun cocks his head to one side and grins.

Kyungsoo hurriedly leans away from the danger of Joonmyun’s hand that’s currently frozen in mid air just inches away from his face. “No.”

Despite Kyungsoo’s protest, Joonmyun leans forward and gives one firm pinch on his left cheek, squishing it so hard that it’s painful and he ends up squawking in protest and slapping his hand away. Nothing ever deters Joonmyun though, because already he’s abandoned the plate somewhere on the floor and manages to latch his other hand onto Kyungsoo’s right cheek.

From that point on, the duty of packing away dishes is forgotten. Two pinches turn into a full on war of tugging at each other’s limbs and accidentally rolling around on the bubble wrap to the point where Kyungsoo might actually have to buy more. But that’s okay because somehow the pinching and tugging turns into kissing all the newly forming splotches of red on their skin, and Kyungsoo is never opposed to the warm feeling of Joonmyun’s lips on his skin.

It’s during moments like these, when Joonmyun is so easily able to pull him out of a bad mood, that he is sure he could never do it. He could never leave whatever their relationship is behind, ever. Truthfully, his relationship with Joonmyun is something he’d never really want to let go of because, even if he doesn’t feel full, he knows that without Joonmyun his heart would shatter. Without him, even if their little gaps in his soul were finally plugged, he’d still like he was missing something, an exchange of one thing for another that would essentially leave him in the same place he started or maybe even worse.

Somehow, over the years, Joonmyun has become just as essential to his existence as the littler parts of him that have always been missing. He doesn’t quite fill all the gaps and needle holes of Kyungsoo’s heart, but he plugs up most of them, and maybe that’s more important than chasing after an absent feeling. Maybe without Joonmyun he’d be left with nothing but the shell of his body as opposed to tiny little slits in his existence. Truthfully speaking, that’s something he never wants to find out.

º º º º

There are only so many cups of overpriced tea and coffee and mini cakes that Jongin can buy before running out of excuses as to why he shows up at L’île Flottante every day for a month straight. There’s only so much money in is his bank account that can be wasted and only so many excuses Jongin can come up with for not going to class. Tomorrow came and tomorrow went and more will come. That’s the nice thing about time, Jongin thinks, is that it always keeps ticking. He may not show up today, but maybe he’ll come tomorrow. It’s a silly hope, but Jongin is good at believing in silly things and he holds Luhan to his promise. We can fix this, he’d said, and Jongin wants to believe him. He’d said he’d fix things with Sehun too, though, and that matter is far from resolved. If anything, it’s only gotten worse.

But Jongin is a master at eluding reality, so instead he takes another sip of coffee or tea and waits for what reality tells him is something that will never come.

In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.