and you breathe
exo ; pg-13 ; au ; baekyeol ; until perdition shines upon you like the lights of heaven out of your reach.
/
reality can be the worst kind of pretending, but it's so hard to just stop.
every moment blends into the next. past, present, future. everything sinks on time, speeding by in slow motion - brushing against every conundrum, every bump and curve. except they're all the same. past, present, future. relative, and non-relative at the same time. all driving together toward the same goal, the same road, the same end, only to come to a full and complete end.
days aren't days, aren't hours or minutes or seconds or milliseconds. days are the sun rising west in the sky and setting north. days are the moon skimming along the edge of the horizon, a red crest at it's peak. days are in-between measures of consciousness and nothing.
days are waiting for the moment when night falls. when darkness cloaks the world and life heads on in a steady thump, like a heartbeat, like the rush of blood through your veins. that's when every intake of air becomes poisonous; that's when you need to keep your eyes open or else you won't be able to see anything. and not being able to see anything is scary. it's terrifying.
baekhyun remembers the cool puff of air against his cheek, a hand on his forehead, fever burning him from the inside out. the world is composed of clouds and soft strings then, perfection in it's golden prime and subtle sweetness thick upon his tongue. the memory is too hard to bear, a constant reminder of all that he's lost. lost - not given up, not ripped away from. lost.
all he needs to do is find it.
/
his favourite colour is white.
baekhyun's clothes are all dirty, hanging off his thin frame. gravel digs deep into the heels of his feet, and when he looks up the sky is red - darkening, soothing, a velvety spread of blood against what's supposed to be a deep-set, sapphire blue. lingering tastes of honey-wine long fade into the bitter tang of oil and machinery. it's not supposed to be like this, he thinks. everything - everything - is so terribly, terribly, wrong.
it's not just that he knows it's wrong, it even feels wrong. the whole wrong-ness crawls under his skin and over his body, steals the air in his lungs, presses against the very curves of his being, a blip in the bigger picture. but it gets to him, and he wants to it go away - childishly, maybe, but he wants it gone.
he doesn't know about anyone else, doesn't speak in the same tongue. it's startlingly cold, like kisses of frost breathing on his skin, but when he looks there baekhyun sees nothing but the smooth expanse of his flesh; so bare, so vulnerable, so human it makes him sick.
every step is another reminder. every sink of the earth beneath his feet, every ring of still heartbeat in his ears. everything around him is as painful as someone holding a hand over your throat. a ringing, a small bell, the soft sounds of fingered notes over a sweet, sublime voice.
learn shame.
baekhyun doesn't need to learn it anymore. it's entwined in his very being, flushed throughout his pores, grated into the porcelain surface of his mind. inky against the pale white that he's been trying so hard to savour. learn shame. shame is not a thing to be learned, it's a lifestyle that cripples you down to your last tear.
baekhyun likes the colour white, especially when there's scarlet splattered across the backdrop.
/
baekhyun has never saved anyone. everything he touches falls to ruins.
he wishes, sometimes. that mothers and daughters and fathers and children would perk up at the sight of him. that flowers would bloom and sing when his fingers grazed against their fragile petals. that his chest would swell when babies laugh. that when he sang it was like a choir from above. he wishes, but without action, wishes are nothing. wishes are bitter promises that are never fulfilled, never will be fulfilled.
sometimes things creep into life and set themselves there like you never know them. sometimes one day it isn't there, and then the next day, it is. baekhyun thinks that life has a funny way of doing things like that.
chanyeol's hands flutter over his shoulders, his waist, the small of his back. chanyeol's mouth is a jumble of nerves that are electrified the moment baekhyun meets them. chanyeol's heart beats thunderously against his fingertips, and baekhyun can't remember where chanyeol came from, exactly - just that he's always been there.
baekhyun also knows that chanyeol is coloured deep red, from the roots of his golden hair to the tips of his feet. red and black, a mess of mistakes and halted breaths, a something that wasn't supposed to happen but happened anyway. chanyeol can kiss him all he likes, but when they part, baekhyun knows that he senses something amiss; baekhyun is too cold, too clear. he doesn't belong in this world of dirt and grime and no blue sky.
"leaving?" baekhyun grumbles, mouth stuck together like someone's glued them shut. chanyeol's on the other side of the dingy motel room, hair a rat's nest and eyes bright with something leaning short on insanity.
"yeah," he says into the open air, where it echoes.
baekhyun doesn't reply. chanyeol always leaves, it's never different. he never changes anything, never reaches out a hand to save anyone. he can't even save himself.
his heart stops when chanyeol closes the door.
/
his life is sealed in a word.
learn shame, someone whispers from the crevices of his mind, where he doesn't dare travel. learn shame, fallen angel. learn to pay for your mistakes. and what he's said then is the same thing that they say to him now. no. no. no, not ever again. he wishes that he didn't see the man with his golden hair and betraying smile, wishes that he can turn back time - turn back days, minutes, hours, milliseconds, but time doesn't matter, time is something that stands still for him. still for all of eternity. past, present, future.
and wishes, wishes are premonitions of what is to be, and what has already passed. wishes are fickle and broken and baekhyun likes them because they remind him of himself. wishes change into anything, blown into the wind like drops of rain.
baekhyun pretends. baekhyun pretends that chanyeol still presses his fingers against his elbows, right where his nerves jump through him. baekhyun pretends that chanyeol still kisses him on the left side of his mouth because chanyeol doesn't like the right. baekhyun pretends that he can feel his hand, gentle on the bumps of his back - then farther up, up, until they're between his shoulder blades, and baekhyun pretends that chanyeol brings their mouths together just the way that makes wings unfold from baekhyun's skin and let him fly.
he pretends, but he knows that his fate is said and done, and that no amount of pretending can shed you away from the cruel vice of reality. chanyeol's hands are too rough, sometimes. chanyeol doesn't come home, sometimes. chanyeol leaves him for months, sometimes. chanyeol is human. chanyeol is imperfect. chanyeol's eyes are bright with dimmed fire. chanyeol. chanyeol. chanyeol.
time stops, but it has always stopped for him. baekhyun doesn't remember when he has made his mistake and when chanyeol once left and never came back, but he remembers the taste of sin, sweet on his tongue, and he remembers laying in a cesspool of innocence, tainted, a white palette streaked with scarlet red.
but mostly, he just remembers wings, wings that let him fly, wings that take him above the thunderclouds and to the blue sky, and he remembers that his wings are gone. remembers smoke and blood and chanyeol. remembers that reality can be the worst kind of pretending, but it's so hard to just stop.
dedicated to dustyfairy. otl it's supposed to be that baekhyun is an angel that gets kicked out of heaven for falling in love with a human, for those of you that don't understand. chanyeol dies, but baekhyun is forever set in a state of frozen time. i'm gonna go cry in a corner now. c: sorry it's so horrible zhuli~