Lumière over me for mayangel7 [2/2]
It’s better like this, Chanyeol reminds himself as he ignores another one of Jongdae’s texts. It sounds false even to his own ears but he shoves the thought out of his mind, instead putting his phone on silent and re-concentrating on the readings he’s trying to finish.
He doesn’t know when he’d begun, but after that conversation with Jongdae by the riverside, he’d stopped responding to Jongdae’s texts as much. They’d left for their respective dorms afterwards and Chanyeol hadn’t been able to concentrate on his work at all once he’d gotten back. He isn’t behind, but it only serves to remind him of the focus he needs if he’s going to fulfill his dream.
He had never meant to do it like this, to cut Jongdae out like this, but he can’t let himself feel too bad about it. After all, Jongdae’s got Joonmyun now. It doesn’t matter that his stomach still twists whenever he thinks about them, doesn’t want to remember just how well Joonmyun treats Jongdae. It shouldn’t. He should be relieved that Jongdae had found someone actually deserving of him. Joonmyun can give him more than stories about galaxies older than humanity, than dreams.
Chanyeol thinks in a lot of shoulds but it doesn’t help how awful he feels when he lets himself think too hard anyway.
So he comes up with excuses when Jongdae asks him to come out, to go see a movie, to watch the play he’s in, to come with him to a concert being put on by the neighbouring school’s orchestra. He doesn’t ever lie, always finding things to do, and it’s not like this is anything new.
But then again he’s never felt this guilty about it, either.
Star gazing by himself is regular occurrence for him; he can hardly fault Jongdae in the past for not being able to stay up late into the night every time for him. He’s done it often enough, and it’s still enjoyable all the same. Sometimes he appreciates the silence, the stillness of the night as he sets up his telescope to find whatever phenomena it is he’s looking for.
He hadn’t asked Jongdae to come with him this time around, although he dearly wishes he could. The Taurid meteor shower would be a spectacular sight, and Chanyeol’s never had the opportunity, or the time, to see them himself before. Jongdae would have loved the fireballs, too, but he knows that tonight is the cast party for the play that Jongdae had just wrapped, a play he’d attended but hadn’t told Jongdae about. In The Heights had been amazing, and Jongdae even more so.
Besides, he’s not supposed to want to see Jongdae anyway. He reminds himself of this for what seems like the millionth time. It won’t be that bad being alone tonight.
And he’s so wrapped up in his star gazing and setting up that he doesn’t even notice it as Jongdae makes his way up the hill, so enthralled that he knocks his telescope completely off course as he jumps, shocked to hear Jongdae’s voice suddenly break through the silence.
“So pretty,” Jongdae enthuses brightly, right in Chanyeol’s ear. He snickers when Chanyeol yelps. “What a sight, huh?”
“What are you doing here?” Chanyeol says weakly, heart still hammering in his chest from the fright. “You scared the shit out of me!”
“Listen, Chanyeol, I already know you’ve been avoiding me; there’s no need to sound so upset with me,” Jongdae says, eyes narrowing as he points an accusatory finger at Chanyeol.
Chanyeol doesn’t pinpoint the difference, why Jongdae’s talking so much louder than he usually does, why he’s standing so much closer, until he notices the red flush in Jongdae’s cheeks.
“Are you drunk?” he asks in disbelief. He’d never seen Jongdae drink so much as a drop of anything stronger than a cooler, always waving off the heavier stuff with an I don’t need it.
“Just a little tipsy,” Jongdae corrects with a smile. “Celebrations, you know? For my musical. You know, the one you missed, you great big asshole. I don’t know why I’m still friends with you; you always break my heart.”
Chanyeol doesn’t want to admit that he had seen it, because that means admitting to avoiding Jongdae, and even though Jongdae apparently realizes as much he doesn’t want to legitimize it through confirmation.
“How did you even know where to find me?” Chanyeol asks instead, hand coming up to ease a slightly swaying Jongdae.
Jongdae laughs, loud into the night, and god, Chanyeol’s missed that laugh.
“Of course you’d be up here!” Jongdae exclaims, still giggling. “Where else would Mr. Spaceman-To-Be be on the night where the Taurid Meteor Shower would be the clearest in the sky? Out here on this chilly ass November night with a huge telescope, that’s where!”
And Chanyeol can’t help but laugh with Jongdae, so, so glad that Jongdae’s here, that Jongdae doesn’t seem to be angry with him, that Jongdae’s smiling in a way that Chanyeol’s missed.
He thinks that the warmth in his chest over the fact that Jongdae knew, Jongdae remembered, is enough to make the cold more than bearable.
“But shouldn’t you be at that party?” he can’t help but ask anyway, no matter how much he wants Jongdae to stay. “Aren’t they going to miss you?” He thinks about Joonmyun, about how he might have been there, too.
“Nah,” Jongdae says, shrugging and collapsing onto the grass with a long, satisfied sigh. “They’ll be okay. I know how much you wanted me to see this meteor shower with you, even if you, for some reason, don’t want to admit it. Anymore, anyway. I mean, I get it, kind of.”
There really is no point in denying it any longer, and Chanyeol slumps onto the grass beside Jongdae and avoids his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he says.
“No, you’re not.” The fondness in Jongdae’s voice eases Chanyeol’s anxiety, though he doesn’t know if it’s just the alcohol that’s making him this way, if sober Jongdae really is upset with him. “But I’m here whether you want me to be or not, and you do, by the way. I remember, I was the only one you’d ever talk about this stuff with. Let’s just enjoy this fabulous show in front of us, shall we? I forgive you. Stop worrying.”
Chanyeol decides to drop it and obey, and they both lie back, watching the streaks of light paint the sky where usually only familiar stars twinkle. It’s easier than he would have thought, slipping back into their usual banter, the same easy jokes as Jongdae makes Chanyeol point out all the visible constellations he can remember.
"Even now, I still can't believe how obsessed you are with space, and the stars," Jongdae snickers at one point, "You should see the look on your face when you look up like that. Wish someone would look at me like that."
And for now, Chanyeol forgets about the fact that he’s drowning in schoolwork, that he hasn’t had a good night’s sleep for weeks. He forgets that they’d fallen out, that he’s been trying to distance himself from his best friend. Forgets about that night, forgets about Joonmyun. Instead, he thinks about how long it’s been since he’s laughed like this, since he’s been able to talk to someone so willing to listen, since he’s hasn’t had to pretend because Jongdae already knows everything about him.
He needs this, he realizes. Needs Jongdae like this, in his life. Needs the familiar, warm, comfortable presence of his best friend by his side. Especially now.
This could be enough. Has to be enough.
They lapse into an easy silence after a while, and it’s natural, normal. There’s no need to fill up the air with meaningless words; this is enough. Chanyeol basks in the feeling, not having realized just how much he’d missed having Jongdae around.
And if this is all he could have, nights like this where Chanyeol can take a break from his studying and Jongdae from the rest of his life, Joonmyun, then he’s happy. It doesn’t hurt as much if he’s got Jongdae beside him like this. Even tipsy, his smile is still the same, his laugh is still the same.
"Jongdae, I'm sorry," Chanyeol says, breaking the silence. "I'm sorry I've been avoiding you and not answering your calls."
Jongdae turns his head to look at him, smile on his face. "It's alright, Chanyeol," he begins, but Chanyeol cuts him off.
"No, it isn't, you had every right to call me an asshole. Frankly, I don't know why you don't hate me. I've been a terrible friend to you." Chanyeol's too busy fidgeting with the grass to notice the look that flickers across Jongdae's face at his words. "But I want to make it up to you, Jongdae, I want to be better for you. And - and if you'll really have me back as your best friend, I'd... really like it if we could do this again. If you want to, that is."
When Chanyeol finally meets Jongdae's eyes, his breath gets stuck in his throat because the light in Jongdae's eyes is brighter than any meteor shower he could hope to see.
Jongdae hesitates, opens his mouth as if to say something, then closes it again as he changes his mind.
"Of course I will, Chanyeol," is what he says eventually, and it doesn't sound like the giddy, carelessness of earlier. It makes something in Chanyeol's chest tighten. "I'd love to."
And as they drift back off into silence, with Jongdae slowly falling asleep beside him, Chanyeol thinks how much he'll miss this, this feeling of happiness. About how this must be alright, that he should be able to be keep Jongdae by his side for just a little longer, as long as he could possibly bear it.
After all, college would be ending soon. And he hasn't told the news to anyone yet, but his dream was finally starting to come true; his application for NASA's basic training program had been approved.
He'll tell Jongdae soon. But for now, as he looks down and watches Jongdae's peaceful sleeping face instead of the meteor shower above, this is enough.
They never quite go back to the same place they were before, but this is understandable. They are not the same people they once were, no longer teenagers, no longer barely adults that are still trying to figure out what to do with their lives.
Chanyeol breaks it to Jongdae on the day of Jongdae’s graduation, about how he’s going to basic training, about the two years he’s going to be gone.
Jongdae just smiles, a little sadly, and fidgets with the tassel of his graduation cap. Around them, the rest of Jongdae’s faculty are celebrating with friends, family. Jongdae’s parents are around somewhere, trying to look for their son, and so is Joonmyun. Chanyeol’s glad for this little moment where they can be alone.
“I’m starting to think you have a complex for dropping bombshells on me at graduation,” Jongdae teases lightly after he’s let Chanyeol from a bone-crushing hug. “Congratulations, Chanyeol, but I’ve got to be honest with you. I kinda already knew.”
Chanyeol gapes. “What do you mean, you already knew? Who told you?”
Jongdae’s eyes are so fond as he consoles his friend. “Oh, Chanyeol, I’ve known ever since you told me in high school. There was never any doubt whether you’d get in or not.”
Chanyeol is speechless but doesn’t have the chance to say anything because Jongdae’s parents arrive at that moment, a flurry of excited squeals and tears from his mother, gruff but proud words from his father. Chanyeol has met Jongdae’s parents a handful of times and he’s always got on well with them; he respectfully takes a few steps backward to let Jongdae have a moment with his family. He watches as Jongdae grins so hard, patting his mother on the back in an effort to console her, clutching the enormous bouquet of flowers that had been pushed into his arms.
And then Joonmyun arrives, a more subtle bouquet in his own hands and looking every inch the handsome boyfriend in his button up and slacks, smile on his face making his eyes crinkle. Chanyeol had met Joonmyun, too, a couple of times and he can understand why Jongdae had been so terribly taken with him. Kind almost to a fault, Joonmyun hadn’t faltered for a moment when Jongdae had enthusiastically introduced them to each other, offering his hand and his friendship easily. Chanyeol had taken it without the same kind of effortless grace as Joonmyun, but had taken it all the same.
Chanyeol watches as Jongdae throws his arms around Joonmyun’s neck, bringing him close for a quick kiss, and it’s always surprised Chanyeol to see Jongdae like this. Though he is no stranger to Jongdae’s penchant for unrepentant affection, somehow it’s different to see Jongdae pressed close to Joonmyun’s side, fingers intertwined between them. Chanyeol doesn’t know how he feels about it all, but he doesn’t try figure it out because as far as he’s concerned, he shouldn’t have any feelings about it anyway.
Quickly, Jongdae’s other friends from his faculty begin to come up to him, the same excited words of congratulations and celebration on their lips as they clamour to hug him, shake his hand. Chanyeol remembers how popular Jongdae is, never having had difficulty making friends with just about anyone he’s ever met. Even over all the voices talking over one another, Chanyeol can hear Jongdae’s bubbling laughter. He takes in the scene before him: Jongdae with Joonmyun’s arm wrapped around his waist, his parents smiling proudly at their son, and all of Jongdae’s friends surrounding him. He smiles, albeit softly, and thinks that Jongdae will be fine without him, and he realizes that he’d never really doubted it in the first place, just like Jongdae had never doubted him.
He pushes away the sadness he can feel creeping up on him, because it’s an unwanted and unwelcome emotion, and instead just focuses on the way Jongdae is smiling as brightly as always.
Life goes on as it always does, and after college Chanyeol’s life becomes simultaneously simpler and more difficult.
Chanyeol spends three years earning his PhD in physics. Two years of training afterwards pass quickly; after all, in his youth he’d kept himself in excellent shape and he’d diligently kept up with the exercise throughout his schooling. He keeps up with Kyungsoo, who’d followed alongside him after college and prepares to apply for the upcoming slew of missions about to be announced, thanks to Kyungsoo’s connections. The work is physically demanding, draining, and consumes most of his time. However, it is easy for the years to fly by when he’s always working towards the same goal, only having to focus on fulfilling the next requirement on his list.
He falls out of touch, for the most part, with the handful of people he’d known in school. It isn’t a conscious decision, but as time goes on, fewer and fewer people make the effort to reach out, to ask how he’s doing. Instead, he meets new people at work, meets other trainees like himself, ones that would most likely be going on the same missions as he will. There’s Oh Sehun and Kim Jongin, younger than him by a few years but are just as brilliant. There’s Zhang Yixing, the Chinese transfer who’d been heavily sought after the results of his simulations had come out, and Kim Minseok, the most senior of all of the training astronauts. These are people that Chanyeol allows himself to become close to because like him, they all understand the consequences of their career. He knows Minseok has a wife that waits for him at home, Yixing a lover he’d left behind in China, and he admires them for their strength, their sacrifices.
The only person he keeps in contact with is, unsurprisingly, none other than Kim Jongdae. Sometimes it’s difficult trying to find a spare weekend where he isn’t preparing for another underwater simulation and Jongdae can find time off from the studio to meet each other, but they’ve managed with less before. Chanyeol spends his breaks getting to listen to the demos that Jongdae sends him, closing his eyes and imagining that the real thing is in front of him, singing to him like the way he always would when they were younger. In return, he indulges himself by sending Jongdae pictures of the results board, his name always near the top of the list, if only because Jongdae always replies with excited selfies and thousands of encouraging stickers.
And it is like this that Chanyeol spends his twenties, training and more training, getting experience on piloting aircraft and researching for the mission that he and his team are all slated to be a part of. It’ll be a small one, one for repairs that only requires him to be up in space for a couple of years at most. They’re just a support group for the crew that are already up there, he and the other inexperienced astronauts. He understands working his way up to the bigger missions, the more important ones, and the fact that he’s even getting an opportunity to go up at all is a miracle in itself. He’s talked to the other astronauts, the ones who, like he, had spent their entire lives training only to wait for years and eventually age past the allowed age range for active astronauts. The idea terrifies him. It makes his resolve stronger; he must train harder, do better, to prove that he is worthy of this mission.
However, the years keep going by and Chanyeol keeps training. There is, of course, always more to do, more to learn, but he’s seen the worried looks of his superiors, felt the tension at the base rise ever so steadily as more and more news comes in daily, bad news. He knows about the budget cuts, the loss of public support as the interest fades. He’d heard about the failed mission as the news had come in; the shuttle that had exploded in less than thirty seconds after launching. Chanyeol keeps training and training, but as each year passes without any hopeful news, he finds himself losing hope, something he never imagined could happen.
It doesn’t even come as a surprise when the mission is called off a few weeks after Chanyeol turns thirty. They’re all gathered in the briefing room and are told that, unfortunately, there wasn’t anything left they could do. Resources had dried up and they weren’t planning on sending anything up into space for at least ten years.
Ten years is far too long for Chanyeol to wait, and he takes the news badly. It had taken him thirty years to get to this point, and only five minutes for everything to come crashing down around him. He would be grounded permanently, although he, at least, had been invited to stay and work as an engineer because of his experience. He knows Minseok has already accepted, and that Yixing is already making plans to go home.
Jongdae is the first person he calls, the first person he even thinks of reaching out to.
“It’s over, Jongdae,” Chanyeol greets when Jongdae picks up on the second ring. “Everything’s over.”
“Chanyeol, I’m so sorry,” Jongdae breathes, softly, and Chanyeol closes his eyes, letting Jongdae’s voice wash over him. Jongdae, of course, had kept with all of the news and even he did not seem surprised.
“What am I supposed to do now?” Chanyeol asks, desperation slipping unbidden into his voice as he clutches his phone. “This was everything, my whole life. And now they’re telling me I’ll never go up, that I’ll be too old, that I should just focus on the work they have down here. Jongin and Sehun, they might have a chance, but the rest of us? What are we supposed to do?”
“Chanyeol, I know how badly you wanted this, I know,” Jongdae says, hesitating. “I know how hard you’ve worked for this, I know how much it means to you. But…” He pauses before continuing in a rush, “maybe… maybe this will be better. For you. After all, there’s plenty to learn and discover from Earth. And - and you won’t even have to leave to do it.” Jongdae sounds hopeful, and Chanyeol knows he’s trying his best to console him. But hearing it from Jongdae only makes the situation feel more real and less like a terrible, terrible nightmare.
And the worst part is that there isn’t anything else for Chanyeol to do but believe Jongdae’s words.
Chanyeol is asked two years later and he’s accepting before they can even finish speaking.
A special mission, they’d said, unprecedented. A last minute endeavour in a last ditch attempt to rally support from the board, from the public. They’d asked him as their best hope, the most experienced, one of the few left from his team who could still be considered. They hadn’t accepted any new trainees since Chanyeol’s round; there was really no one else they could have asked.
“Chanyeol? Are you finished for today already? I was wondering if we were still on for this weekend,” Jongdae says when he picks up Chanyeol’s call. Ever since Chanyeol had accepted his desk job, they’ve been able to spend much more time together. Jongdae had been delighted, and Chanyeol had allowed himself to open up now that it was no longer a risk.
“Jongdae, I’m going,” Chanyeol whispers, fingers shaking as he tries to hold back the tears pricking the corners of his eyes. It’s finally happening, he’s finally going.
“That’s great! Joonmyun was just saying--”
“No, Jongdae, you don’t understand,” Chanyeol interrupts. “I’m going. To space. They asked me just now and - oh my god, Jongdae, I can’t believe it, I’m actually going.”
“What?” Jongdae asks, and Chanyeol can hear the way his friend’s voice cracks. “What do you mean? I thought you said - you told me. You said you weren’t, that it was cancelled.”
“This wasn’t planned, this is different, but Jongdae don’t you see? It doesn’t matter, all that matters is that they asked me. I almost couldn’t, I almost lost hope, but I am.” Chanyeol can’t help the sob that escapes, overwhelmed as the tears finally fall from his face.
“How long will you be gone for?” Jongdae asks, voice oddly contorted through the phone. “It can’t be long, right? A short mission. Because you’re thirty-two, they couldn’t possibly let you stay for too long.”
Chanyeol pauses as the full weight of the situation finally settles down on him, the agreement he’d given so rashly.
“It’s not that kind of mission, Jongdae,” he replies after a long moment and he remembers that it isn’t just about him anymore.
“And what is that supposed to mean?” Jongdae hisses and Chanyeol can tell that Jongdae already knows, has already figured it out.
It’s his father that Chanyeol thinks of when he says, “Not all spacemen come home.”
His mother cries when he tells her, cries and cries like she hasn’t for twenty-five years. Chanyeol sits with her and doesn’t cry, just like he hadn’t when he was seven years old and his father had left for the last time.
“I’m sorry,” he keeps saying, and he means it. He means it enough that the words keep choking him. He remembers how he’d once vowed never to make his mother cry for him, remembers the way his house had felt so cold after his father had left. Remembers eating dinner with his mother, barely nine years old and wondering how he could make his mother smile because he misses when his mother used to do that. He remembers how sad she’d always looked.
The way his mother is shaking is worse, exponentially worse, and he knows this time it’s completely his fault and he can do nothing about it.
“I’m so sorry,” he repeats, over and over because he has nothing else to say, no promises he can make to her. His heart burns when he realizes how empty the house will be, how there will be no one to come and visit her on the weekends to check on her and her thriving garden.
“You don’t have to be,” his mother tells him, struggling futilely to smile when she looks up at him and cups his face with her hand. He looks at his mother and how the lines on her face are deeper now, more numerous, and he’s sorry because his mother had only had him left. “You don’t have to apologize, Chanyeol, my son. Don’t apologize for being happy.”
And as he takes his mother - his mother who is so strong, so loving, his mother who’s always known that she would be losing the two most important people in her life - in his arms, he doesn’t feel happy at all. His heart breaks for the mother that he loves so, so much and he remembers again why he hadn’t, couldn’t let himself love freely.
Jongdae is allowed to visit Chanyeol during the final stages of his training; he just doesn’t do it very often because Chanyeol won’t let him.
Chanyeol thinks that Jongdae probably knows what he’s doing. After all, Chanyeol’s played the distancing game before and he’d failed at it miserably. But still, this doesn’t stop him from making up excuses to avoid seeing Jongdae. At this point, it almost comes second nature to him - a fact that he does not miss, a fact that is bitter to swallow.
Jongdae had congratulated him, of course, had told him how happy he was for Chanyeol. But even though Jongdae seemed to understand, Chanyeol had learned his lesson.
All the same, he can’t help how grateful he is when Jongdae barges into one of his underwater training sessions, frown on his face.
“You can’t avoid me forever, Park Chanyeol,” Jongdae says sharply at Chanyeol, who can’t hear him from where he is underwater. Chanyeol has a good idea anyway and only throws himself harder into his practice.
He’s exhausted and nauseous once he’d finally called it quits and had left the pool, slowly unsuiting in the changing room. He knows Jongdae is still waiting for him, and he feels sick enough that the thought doesn’t even upset him as much.
“You look awful, Chanyeol,” Jongdae tells him kindly when Chanyeol finally emerges, hair wet and legs dragging. Chanyeol doesn’t even hesitate when he slumps down beside Jongdae, leaning on him heavily in exhaustion.
“Difficulty level was set to the highest,” Chanyeol mutters, “Gotta get used to it. It’ll be worse up there, they said. I still feel like throwing up, though.”
Jongdae’s hand stills from where it’s carding through Chanyeol’s drying hair at the reminder, but resumes after a moment. “I told you attending those college parties would have been good for you,” he says lightly after a moment. “You’d probably be better at this nauseous business.”
Chanyeol snorts. “Well, it’s too late now,” he says heavily. “I guess I’ll just have to deal with it.”
“Your mom’s been asking about you,” Jongdae says, switching the topic. “Wanted to know how you’ve been doing. I didn’t know how to break it to her that I wouldn’t know.” His words are steely as he says them.
Chanyeol had asked, a few days after he’d told his mother, Jongdae for his help. Promise me you’ll call her, at least, he’d begged, Just to make sure she’s alright. He wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if he left her without anybody. She likes you.
And Jongdae had, inexplicably, scowled. And who’s going to call me? he’d snapped, arms crossing. To make sure I’m alright?
Chanyeol had just blinked, confused. But you’ll - you’ll be fine, he’d said. You’ve got Joonmyun, your friends.
Jongdae had sighed afterwards, eyes weary. He’d nodded, eventually, and promised. I’ll take care of her for you, Chanyeol.
“Just tell her I’m fine,” Chanyeol replies, shrugging. “I don’t want to upset her... any more than I already have,” he corrects.
Jongdae looks at him searchingly. “But are you really? Are you really fine?” he presses.
And for Jongdae’s sake, Chanyeol nods, pushing himself upright. “I’m okay. I promise.”
In the last couple of weeks, Chanyeol says his last goodbyes and throws himself wholeheartedly into last minute preparations. Some goodbyes are easy, like to the acquaintances he’s made at the station. Some goodbyes are harder, like the video call he has with Yixing, who wishes him the best, his new wife and child sitting beside him waving. Minseok shakes his hand but then pulls him into a tight hug, and when he pulls back there are tears in his eyes.
“Do it for the both of us,” Minseok tells him, “Do it for all of us.”
Sehun and Jongin are more composed, but they both embrace him warmly when he makes his final goodbyes to them.
“Make sure you don’t take too long following me up there,” Chanyeol instructs.
Sehun snorts, but his eyes are wet. “You’re crazy, dude,” he says. “But I’m going to miss your crazy ass anyway.”
He makes a last visit to his mother a week before he leaves. She doesn’t cry this time, having had months now to come to terms. They spend two days together, going over old memories and Chanyeol probably says I love you to her more times in those two days than he’s ever said in his whole life. He makes her promise not to tell Jongdae when he’s leaving, telling her that it’s for the best, that he would say goodbye another way. She doesn’t seem convinced but agrees. He kisses her cheek when he leaves, and this time it is he who can’t help the tears he sheds when he watches her grow more and more distant as he drives away from his house.
He’s put off saying goodbye to Jongdae until the very end, because for some reason he can never bring himself to actually do it. He’s tried working up the courage countless times, only to lose his nerve before he can hit dial on his phone. He doesn’t think he could face seeing Jongdae in person, doesn’t think he could possibly do it justice if he’s faced with a crying Jongdae. Because knows, he knows this will be the hardest goodbye they’ll both ever have to face. He knows Jongdae’s been trying to remain calm but he can tell when his best friend begins to crack, he knows him well enough for at least that.
Instead he writes a letter, one that takes him hours and dozens of attempts to get right. In the letter, he thanks Jongdae for everything. He thanks him for being his friend when no one else would, for staying his friend even though Chanyeol definitely never deserved it. He thanks Jongdae for being a perfect, beautiful person and wishes him happiness.
Even though I’m hurting you, because I am, I know it. I knew I would when I let you become my friend, let myself care for you. I knew it and yet I still allowed it, and for that I’m eternally sorry. You don’t deserve what I’ve done to you, what I’m going to do to you. I’m sorry, and I hope one day, you might find it in your heart to forgive me, even though I definitely don’t deserve it. Knowing you, you probably will, anyway.
He mails it to Jongdae by express post and he reminds himself that he’s supposed to be happy. He’s finally going to achieve the dream he’s worked so hard for. It’s not supposed to feel like this, like a sentencing.
Chanyeol thinks he shouldn’t be surprised to see Jongdae, given his track record of never letting Chanyeol’s cowardice get the better of him. But still when he’s informed of one last visitor as he’s waiting in the final holding room before launch he feels as if the air has been knocked out of him when Jongdae walks in.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” Chanyeol says weakly, and all of a sudden his legs feel like they’re going to collapse from beneath him. “Jongdae, you’re not supposed to be here.”
“Park Chanyeol, you are the biggest idiot in the world - and the entire galaxy, for that matter - if you thought that I would let you get away with the stunt you tried to pull on me with that stupid letter,” Jongdae says, but he doesn’t look angry. Chanyeol thinks Jongdae’s never looked so small before, so resigned.
“I’m sorry,” Chanyeol says and the words are harder to say around the lump in his throat.
“You’re always sorry, Chanyeol,” Jongdae answers with a sigh. “Stop telling me you’re sorry because sorry doesn’t change anything.”
“Jongdae, I -”
“Forget it, Chanyeol,” Jongdae interrupts with a wan smile. “I’m not here to make you feel bad. I’m just… just here to be your friend. One last time.”
The silence in the room is echoing as Chanyeol stares into his best friend’s face, the one face he knows he could never bear saying goodbye to.
One of the attendants comes into the room then, apologies written on her face as she tells them they have five minutes left.
“Do you remember that space suit we designed together in high school?” Jongdae asks, small smile on his face. “Can you believe that’s what brought us together? You and your shyness, how cute you were when you fumbled over your words, how you used to go on and on about things I only half-understood back then but you were so excited about it. I remember how much I envied you, back then.”
Chanyeol silently disagrees about this, because that can’t be possible when it was he that was always envious of Jongdae.
“This suit’s nowhere near as nice as the one we made,” Jongdae finishes.
“That’s because they care about me surviving,” Chanyeol jokes weakly, remembering the conversation from so many years ago. “And besides, this suit’s plenty flashy.”
Jongdae’s small hand gently reaches out to touch the patch on Chanyeol’s chest, in the same place that he’d drawn a similar patch on their design, the one that had CJ written on it instead of NASA. He shakes his head, lets out soft laughter and says, “Don’t you remember, Chanyeol? You’ve got the brains, I’m the one with the style. It’s why we work.”
Chanyeol can feel his heart beating so fast in chest, hammering away and making it hard to breathe. He just wants to chalk it up to excitement, that everything is finally coming together, that’s he’s going to space.
The smile on Jongdae’s face is nothing like the one that Chanyeol knows, that is more familiar to him than his own smile, when he stretches up onto his toes to kiss Chanyeol on the forehead. And Chanyeol’s heart beats just that much faster and it must be the suit adjusting for air pressure, oxygen levels, his heart just responding to the changes.
“Just know that I’ll always be here waiting for you if you ever decide you want to come back,” Jongdae says with an empty laugh, “My spaceman.”
And the look on Jongdae’s face as he says it tears at him, there’s no use denying it, and for a split second he thinks wildly if this is how his father felt when he’d left.
“When,” Chanyeol hears himself whispering at the last minute, when he turns around to take one last look at Jongdae before the doors close. “When I’ll get back.” And he wonders when he ever started making empty promises.
Chanyeol’s last glimpse of Jongdae is of Jongdae with tears sparkling in his eyes staring back at him and he thinks they look an awful lot like stars in that moment.
And it’s only then, finally then, that he realizes how much he doesn’t really want to go because his dream is standing behind the doors that have just closed behind him. He realizes how much he wishes he could go back, refuse to leave, because despite all of his efforts he’s fallen in love when he was supposed to. Regrets his decision to sign all of those papers, sign his life away because he’s signed off his heart to Space when his heart is no longer his to sign away.
And he wishes he could take everything back, every moment back because he wants to take back the worst mistake he’d ever made: letting Jongdae fall in love with him, too. Because he remembers now, remembers how Jongdae had always agreed with him about the universe, about how how amazing and full of wonder it is - but that Earth could maybe have the same kind of wonder. Remembers what Jongdae had murmured afterwards, about how cold and vast and lonely the universe is. Remembers the look in Jongdae’s eye when he tells him how it could be better if he could share it with someone, see it through someone else’s eyes. And he’d never realized what that look had meant back then because he’d always been too busy looking at the stars to pay much notice.
(Chanyeol had thought back then that he was good at loneliness, good at managing to get by with just one friend, when he’s only ever been good at Jongdae.)
(five years later - epilogue)
Space is just as beautiful as Chanyeol had always imagined, alone in his ship.
It’s everything he’s ever dreamed of, how it feels to touch the sky, to drift amongst the stars. It’s stunning, aweing, and it makes Chanyeol feels so wonderfully small.
And of course, the first person Chanyeol wants to his story to is the same person he’d had to leave behind to do it. He thinks, not for the first time, about maybe turning around, tracing his steps back home.
The lenses on his camera equipped on the spacecraft are too fragile to be able to capture Earth any more, and it’s one of the sights that he misses most. He remembers taking his first breath of recycled air, watching as the Earth grew smaller and smaller and feeling pure awe at the breathtaking sight. But he also remembers how much his heart had hurt thinking about the price he’d had to pay to witness it, how much he’d wanted to reach out and call home to Jongdae, to apologize for ever thinking that he could let him go like that.
But he’s not meant to be capturing images of Earth anyway, that’s not what he’s set out to do. It’s the data that’s being constantly transmitted back to the Earth that is what’s needed. It’s what has him dismissing the idea of going back home from his mind.
He doesn’t let himself ruminate on the past too often. Five years is a long time to spend anguishing in his regrets and his work was far too important for him to allow it. But every now and then, as he’s looking out at stars that, by the time their light hits his eyes, are already gone, he has to remind himself that he can’t let himself think the same thing about Jongdae.
Jongdae is waiting, he thinks instead. Jongdae is waiting for me and I can’t let him down like that.
It’s the only thing that keeps him focused on his work while he waits for a message he hopes might come asking for him to come back home.
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