[Fic] For Always - 24/24
Title: For Always
Author: Coley Merrin
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Zhou Mi/Kyuhyun and Siwon/Hankyung (with possible additions)
Genre: AU. Drama/Romance/Angst/Fluff/The kitchen sink
Summary: The bookstore called "Soulmate" has been the most important thing in Kyuhyun's life. With it, he has built a fortress of brick and page around himself, one that can only be brought down from the inside -- both with love and with danger.
Hankyung has built a life of meaning, but finds no substance in it and lives in dreams. Dreams that, when they materialize, make him question his ability to reach and hold on when he wants nothing less.
***
Chapter One ** Chapter Two ** Chapter Three ** Chapter Four ** Chapter Five ** Chapter Six ** Chapter Seven ** Chapter Eight ** Chapter Nine ** Chapter Ten **
Chapter Eleven ** Chapter Twelve ** Chapter Thirteen ** Chapter Fourteen ** Chapter Fifteen ** Chapter Sixteen ** Chapter Seventeen ** Chapter Eighteen ** Chapter Nineteen ** Chapter Twenty ** Chapter Twenty One ** Chapter Twenty Two ** Chapter Twenty Three ** Chapter Twenty Four ** Extended Scenes (Smutty Extras)
Sequel: Forever
***
Chapter Twenty Four
***
For Kyuhyun the dam had finally broken at home, letting go with wrenching sobs against Zhou Mi and feeling the answering gasps against him. Both of them reacting not only to the letdown of the stress of the day, but to the reaction of each other. The feel of the the heavy book in his hands, feeling it thud off of the gunman’s head... Hearing Siwon’s desperate order for an ambulance. Seeing Hankyung on the floor... In the hospital bed.
“I’m so glad the police have those men, and we don’t have to worry about them out there...somewhere,” he told Zhou Mi when he could talk. He wanted to bang his head on the wall. He really hated to cry...
“I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like if we didn’t know where they were,” Zhou Mi said, agreeing with him wholeheartedly.
Zhou Mi stroked his back as they undressed. All he wanted was the shower, and to sleep. Maybe he would wake up tomorrow and it would all be better.
Zhou Mi let him into the shower first, cuddling him from behind, resting his chin on Kyuhyun’s shoulder.
He shivered despite the hot water, turning to lift his face to Zhou Mi’s for a kiss.
“It could have been you,” he whispered. “Any of us. But it could have been you. Not just hurt but...”
“But it wasn’t. And Hankyung will be just as good as new. You were amazing today, you know that? Wielding that book, even after that idiot hit you.” Zhou Mi ran a gentle thumb along the edge of Kyuhyun’s lip. “I don’t think I could have done that.”
Kyuhyun snorted. “You can’t even kill a spider.”
“You’re right. I can only love you.”
Zhou Mi’s arms tightened around him and he shook his head. “That’s not true. I felt you with me, beside me, supporting me today. If I hit that man, so did you. Because I didn’t do that alone. Why are you still here, after all of this?”
“Because you don’t run away on the people you love. And I love you, Kui Xian. I love you till it hurts. Darling... I need you. I’ll smile for you.”
He could have rolled his eyes at the ridiculous lines, but he wanted that smile and he got it. A wide smile just for him.
It was not desire so much that led them to touch, but the need to remember they were alive.
They crawled into bed, relishing the feel of skin against skin. Real and solid and close, his Zhou Mi. He felt utterly drained. They whispered words of love, barely voicing it as Zhou Mi stroked his hair.
He had never been more secure in the knowledge that this was love. He and Zhou Mi had found that. Zhou Mi seemed to suit his quirks, filling where he could not.
“Zhou Mi,” he whispered.
“Hm?”
He shook his head. It was only to know he was there.
***
He was half dressed after talking to Siwon on the phone to make sure Hankyung was still okay before his resolve gave out. He crawled back under the covers and squished against the heat-radiating Zhou Mi, purring as he pressed his chilly feet to Zhou Mi’s nice, warm legs.
There was a short scuffle, which he won, oozing into a half sleep while buried in Zhou Mi’s neck.
“Put socks on before you get back into bed,” Zhou Mi chided straight into his ear.
“Mm, warm,” he murmured.
“Kiss me, Kui Xian.”
“Definitely shouldn’t have gotten back into bed...”
“I’m glad you did,” Zhou Mi said sweetly, kissing along his jaw.
He traced Zhou Mi’s cheekbone. “Now I really know I shouldn’t... Hey!”
But he wasn’t laughing as Zhou Mi pulled him on top of him, kissing him generously.
They jerked against each other as someone knocked on the apartment door. Zhou Mi’s eyes were wide as they stared at each other, frozen.
“Oh! It could be the police!” he said, pulling himself toward the edge of the bed.
“It could be anyone else, too!” Zhou Mi yelped, scooting after him. “I’m coming with you.”
“You’re naked. You can’t answer the door naked. The police frown on that.”
“I can if it’s you going to the door by yourself. I’ll get pants.” Zhou Mi grabbed the closest thing that resembled pants as Kyuhyun pulled down his shirt and bee-lined for the door. He could hear Zhou Mi tugging his clothes on and racing after him as he rushed for the entrance.
It was definitely not the police, he realized as he opened the door with Zhou Mi right behind him. But it was very much his father.
***
Zhou Mi eased to the side, quick motions indicating that Kyuhyun should let him inside, and that he would call the police.
He let his father inside reluctantly. Every cell in his body wanted to send him away, erase his existence from anywhere near him. But he couldn’t Not for Hankyung, or for Zhou Mi, or Siwon, or the children... All of them deserved answers that this one...person could provide.
“If you’re coming over to express your condolences for Hankyung being shot,” he said, shutting the door and crossing his arms, “you’re about a hundred years late.”
“What?!” his father asked, looking genuinely startled. “Who was shot? Where?”
“Don’t act as though you know nothing about it. It’s insulting.”
“It’s not insulting when I don’t know anything. I haven’t even been around Seoul in days. Seriously, what happened?”
He felt Zhou Mi come up beside him.
“It was at the store. Two men with guns came in looking for you. And my friend, Hankyung, he was shot. Just like I told you.”
“Is that what happened to your face?”
He probed his sore lip, having forgotten about it, and feeling the ache in it from Zhou Mi’s kisses.
“Yeah, it is. Seems like they wanted to find you pretty badly. Now tell me how to fix that.”
“Hankyung... That’s your Chinese friend? Your mother told me a little about him. Didn’t like you spending so much time with him. Seems you like Chinese men,” he said, glancing at Zhou Mi, who tightened his hand on Kyuhyun’s arm.
But Kyuhyun had heard something in there that didn’t make sense.
“Mom? You talked to mom? I didn’t even meet Hankyung until after you left.”
“I called home every month to make sure you didn’t need anything. You were still my son whether I was there or not.”
“She... She never told me you called.”
He wondered what else she hadn’t told him. What else he hadn’t known. He had been a teenager when his father had gone. He hadn’t been that young. He could have dealt with it. He could have...
“Probably didn’t want you to get your hopes up that I would come home,” his father said, with apology in his voice. “There wasn’t any chance of that.”
He opened his mouth to deny that it would have ever crossed his mind to think of that, but his father frowned at him.
“How long did it take you to stop waiting? I know. I missed you, too. What do you want from me, Kyuhyun? I’ll do what I can for you. I came back to Korea hoping I could... I know at the root of this I am at fault. But you’re still my son.”
“Tell me who sent the gunmen. Who ordered people to break into my apartment, and Zhou Mi’s. Who set the fire. Who was responsible for this... All of this.”
His father seemed to think a moment. “You called the police when I arrived? Good. Because I can tell you that. I can tell you who was behind everything that has happened.”
All of the information they had been missing, the whos and the whys, had been sewed up inside of his father’s absence. His father had sent Zhou Mi to check to see the state of Kyuhyun’s book collection. And it had gotten him nowhere. How ironic that his actions in sending Zhou Mi had started this whole cascade...
***
It was tense waiting for the police to arrive, sitting in one of their kitchen chairs in silence as he waited for Zhou Mi to dress. They’d had a short, tense discuss over whether Zhou Mi should leave Kyuhyun alone with his father.
“He’s not going to attack me with you fifteen feet away,” he whispered, pushing on Zhou Mi’s stomach. “Just don’t close the door all the way or something.”
When Zhou Mi had returned, they had switched places, hands sliding against each other’s as they passed. When he had gone back into the living room, feeling quite a bit more girded with socks and a better shirt, Zhou Mi was somewhat easily conversing old books and Chinese trends with his father.
It was still bizarre to think, even after all this time and all the times he had already considered it, that Zhou Mi knew his father. That they could have conversations, history. How different, this situation, that him meeting Zhou Mi’s family. Such a different amount of expectation and an absence of joy. He didn’t think he was supposed to feel ill, seeing Zhou Mi, innocent and dear, so near to someone who betrayed him.
It was deliberate that he sat beside Zhou Mi, positioning them both against his father as the police talked with him.
Somehow he still ended up asking questions.
“The police have the men who held up the store. But this woman... If she’s behind it, how do we get her?” he asked.
“Give her what she wants,” his father said.
“What is that?”
“She must want the book. Her men though... If that’s who attacked the store, maybe they’ll give her up.”
“Why? The book was yours. What did you do?”
Somehow he knew without being told.
“It was never mine. Not really. I knew they were shady people... Loaning money to people and extracting it in ways you can’t imagine. But I helped them obtain books... I saw that one there. It was...pristine. Amazing. Everything I had ever worked for. I could never afford to buy it.”
“So you stole it? Then you lied to me.”
“To keep you safe! It was our secret.”
“So when you left they thought you took it with you. And that’s why I couldn’t tell Mom.”
Years of lies upon lies. Swearing to his mother the only books of his father’s in the building were below.
“You just raised their suspicions by letting this punk,” his father said, inclining his head in a genial way toward Zhou Mi, “stay as long as you did. If he had written about the book, they really would have known. They sent me pictures of you, thinking I’d crack.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? Why did someone have to get shot before you tell me this? I’d have traded all of them to keep that bullet out of Hankyung. He has children. You made us live in fear for a decade all because of one book that you didn’t even keep!”
“I never thought it would happen like that.”
“Why didn’t they come after the store? They could have stolen our home and everything in it from us.”
“I don’t mean to say that I feel I did anything better in taking the book because she killed to get it,” his father said. “But I wanted no part in fighting or seeing someone get hurt.”
“They why did you leave instead of giving it back?” Kyuhyun butted in.
“They thought I still had it when I left. And I did leave because...Because they nearly killed you to make me give it back.”
Kyuhyun searched his memory before his father laid it out in short, quick details. He remembered the broken flesh on his elbow and his father’s frightened face more than he remembered the acute fear of nearly getting run over, of hearing the car speed away.
“Because it was always about the book,” he said, resigned.
All the things that had happened when he was young had never been coincidence. Not the fire, not his mother’s fear, or his father’s absence.
But even knowing that, it was surreal to sit and listen to his father detail how he had stolen a book from the mistress of a crime lord. To imagine back to that time, when his father was gone long hours consulting... To know all of those memories had been leading to this.
***
His father had left with the police, not under arrest because they had no evidence of any crime, but to continue giving them information. It gave him the chance to go to the store, to enter it for the first time since the shooting. It was bright, smelled of Ryeowook’s coffee cake and books, and Ryeowook was hugging him immediately.
“I called the hospital. Sounds like Hankyung spent an easy night.”
“Yeah, thank goodness,” he said wearily. As soon as the day was over, Zhou Mi would pick him up and they would go to see him. And hopefully some of the tension would drop from him. Henry came in, concerned about Hankyung, and all continued as usual. If ignoring a bullet hole in the counter was usual.
The three of them gathered around the counter when the police walked in, eager for any news. To hear the details of the vague information his father had given that morning was startling.
“The two men who held up the store used to work for one of the most prolific crime lords in the city,” the detective said. “We’ve been trying to nail him for ages. When he and his mistress split a year ago or so, their patterns changed... We suspect those two men went with her during the split instead, either by orders or by choice. Our informants weren’t privy to that information. This is a picture we have of them...”
Kyuhyun jerked, as Henry loudly exclaimed, “No!”
The police were sharp to the reaction. “Do you recognize someone here?”
“Lee...” He pointed to the leader’s picture. “I don’t know what his name is. He loans money to people?”
“Among other things. He’s been involved with smuggling, loan sharking, for a number of years. But he’s smart. We’ve never been able to pin him down. How do you know him?”
“My...friend borrowed money from him. I think. He’s afraid of the man. I never knew... I never guessed...”
“Did he know you worked for Mr. Cho?”
“No...?”
That seemed to satisfy them, but he wouldn’t meet Kyuhyun’s eyes, even as they stood to listen. Kyuhyun stared at the picture of this supposed crime lord and his mistress. Even Henry had been touched by this.
This woman who had been behind everything. He could have lost his friends, his livelihood. And this woman, slender and still young looking, who had been involved in the killing of her own family... She could have walked into the door, talked with him or Ryeowook or Henry. And none of them would have known. He could have put her books in a bag, answered a compliment to the animals Zhou Mi had given him.
“She won’t be able to do this again?” he asked the detective.
“We’ll see to it.”
***
Donghae’s “uncle” couldn’t have known where Henry had worked... There had been that one time that Donghae had lied to his uncle about where Henry worked, as though... As though Donghae had been trying to keep him from that knowledge.
And they had talked about Kyuhyun and his books more than once. Donghae had been so interested. And come to find out that his “uncle’s” men... His “uncle’s” mistress’s men had been behind everything?
Donghae cringed as Henry threw open the door.
“Did you know?” he asked, trembling with he knew not what. Anger? Fear? “Did you know something was going to happen at the bookstore?”
“I didn’t!” Donghae insisted. “I didn’t. I... I hoped nothing would happen, ever. When Ryeowook called... Knowing he had been here with us. He made us his alibis. I can’t...”
“If you know anything, come with me so you can tell someone. Those are my friends. One of them could have died. All of them could have. There were kids there. One of them is the cutest little girl you can imagine. She had to watch one of her fathers bleed while the other worried. You have to tell someone.”
Donghae’s eyes widened. “There were kids there?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll tell what I know... Henry, I swear I didn’t mean...” Donghae’s words trailed off before he spoke again softly. “They won’t like it if they find out.”
“I’ll protect you,” Henry said, laughed a bit at Donghae’s incredulous look. “You’re doing the right thing. Thank you, Donghae.”
“I went over there they day after the shooting. My uncle laughed when one of his men told him she might be arrested. Saying it served her right for taking the weakest ones. I didn’t really think anything about it when they asked me to hang around, keep an eye out on the bookstore in my free time. They never really told me what they were doing. Thought I would talk too much. I didn’t realize they wanted me to look in on what she was doing.”
“You... You never went to the bookstore after we met,” Henry said, confused.
“I know... They’d ask me things about the store, and I’d just tell them whatever you’d told me about your day. Nothing happened, or friends had stopped by...”
“From me? You were feeding them information from me? So when you asked about Kyuhyun and the books? Oh! That night you told me your cousin was curious?”
“They asked me. I didn’t want them to know I hadn’t been going to the store like they asked, so... I swear that was the only thing I asked you that they wanted. I didn’t want to go to the store... I didn’t figure I’d meet...someone like you. I just wanted to spend time with you. I told you as much as I knew. Just not who they were. I never wanted to hide it from you. I wanted to spend time with you.”
It was something he could believe. Kind-hearted Donghae.
“I was going to leave Korea.”
Henry’s heart tightened. “What?”
“The beginning of the school quarter when I met you. I was leaving. I didn’t care where. I had fake papers, and I was going to sell my father’s watch to get enough for a plane ticket. It was safest, right after the start of a quarter, when they thought I was settling in. I was going to get away and never come back. I didn’t want anything to do with them. And then... Then I knocked you down in the store. And you looked up at me? I couldn’t get you out of my head. And then you were in my class. It was an accident. I was supposed to get information at Soulmate, not to hang out with you.”
“I don’t think it was an accident, Donghae,” he said, staring at the scarred table.
“No, Henry, no, you have to believe me,” Donghae said, covering Henry’s hands with his, voice panicked. “I swear I had no idea you were in the class. I had a huge crush on you. I swear it was real. I swear, Henry...”
“No!” Henry said, interrupting Donghae, the relief trickling through him at Donghae’s heartfelt insistence. He knew it, was glad that he had heard it. Felt bad that he had let Donghae continue as long as he had. “I mean that I don’t think it was an accident because... Do you believe in fate? You meeting me might have freed you. It wasn’t an accident. It was your salvation.”
“Henry,” Donghae breathed, eyes tearing.
“You would have told me if you had known something was going to happen. Told someone. I know you love me. And those are my friends. They’ll love you because I love you.”
Donghae hands tightened over Henry’s, and his tears dropped heavily onto the table.
“I owed them more than I could pay back. I started doing little jobs for them, just fetching or delivering, anything to try and work down my debt. I knew they weren’t good people. But my dad didn’t have any choice at the time. He planned on being able to pay them back himself.”
Henry listened as Donghae told him everything. Everything he wanted Henry to know first.
And his eyes widened when Donghae’s smile sharpened, a gleam of satisfaction in his eyes. “I’m already feeding information to the police. I started the day after you met my uncle. My uncle. I’ll look forward to not having to say that any more.”
He listened as Donghae called his police contact, told him everything he had just told Henry. And wondered where it would take them next.
***
Kyuhyun and Zhou Mi went every day to see Hankyung at the hospital. Siwon or his mother could be found, baby in arm, at his bedside at almost any hour. And Hankyung had begun to look more like himself again.
They were there for the day Hankyung was wheeled out, taking the baby steps from the wheelchair to sit in the passenger side of the car to go home. How Hankyung had been flustered at the cheers, and the smacking kiss Siwon had planted on him.
Kyuhyun had looked up at the hospital that had made sure Hankyung would stay with them, and realized he really didn’t mind if he didn’t see it again for a while.
With the information his father had provided as leverage, the gunmen had talked, laying out everything they knew of this woman’s involvement. How they had been paid, instructed, to break in, to set the fire. Things designed to scare Kyuhyun and his father into giving up.
The woman wasn’t quite sane, he realized, frowning down at the simple package in his hands. She wanted to see the book when she was arrested. That was all she had asked. To see the book. She had killed her own father to own it. Such a small book that had caused so much trouble. That had nearly cost the life of his oldest friend. And because there was no trail, no real owner that could be found, the book had come back to him.
There was a museum out there, somewhere, that would cherish it. Zhou Mi could help him choose one. They could be done with it once and for all.
And now that the woman would be put in prison, there would be no more danger. No more break ins. No more sleepless nights. Yes, they had to catch the man who had trained those gunmen, but he had no ties to the store. With this... With this he was free.
***
Siwon settled onto the bed with Geng, pulling a slender hand to his mouth and pressing gentle kisses to each finger. It was...amazing to see him back in their bed, in their room. It was like he was truly coming home when they had come slowly up the front stairs, pulling up the plush chair so that Geng could rest after his strenuous trip home. Yunjoong was with Geng’s mother until Yunjee was out of school so that they could have this time alone together, just the two of them. They had chatted while Siwon prepared lunch for him, cuddled during an afternoon nap.
And now here they were...
“How are you feeling?”
“Tired. Sore. The usual. But not bad, all in all. Don’t worry, Siwon. I’m okay...”
He ran his hand gently over the perfect stomach, one gentle curve to the other, stopping short of the bandage covering the angry, healing welt.
“Not quite as attractive any more, is it?” Geng asked, and Siwon glared.
“You could have a hundred of these and still be the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”
He gave a breathy laugh, even that a source of pain from the look on his face, and tugged Siwon down.
“I’d rather not have a hundred bullet holes,” he said against Siwon’s cheek. “But thank you for the offer anyway. When I’m old and flabby and wrinkly, I guess it won’t stand out quite as much.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he said, kissing Hankyung gently. “I’ll still love you then anyway. I meant forever, Geng. You can’t leave me before then.”
Hankyung let his hand be taken, and twined his fingers with Siwon’s.
“You and I and the kids will live together forever,” Siwon said, sounding very positive of this fact.
“You realize, right,” Hankyung asked, “that they’ll grow up and move away and get married?”
“Now that’s crazy talk.”
“But even then, you’ll still have me.”
A tiny wail was heard through the static of the baby monitor, and Hankyung turned his head toward it, gauging the intensity of the cry.
“Sounds like the little prince is awake and hungry.”
“I’ll go check on him. And Geng... We’ll have each other.”
He talked to Yunjoong as he changed his diaper, knowing both the baby and Geng could hear him. He knew it would make Geng smile.
Siwon fed Yunjoong his bottle in the chair beside their bed, the tiny, baby hands opening and closing as he ate with greedy fervor. He had looked in on Yunjee, who was sprawled and deeply sleeping. Geng had fallen asleep before he had returned, and Siwon was glad for that, glad to see him healing. Even when sleeping he had a smile.
***
Hankyung dreamed he was alone for the first time in a long time, ready to jerk himself out of sleep even at the possibility. They had joked of rainbows, he and Kyuhyun. He hadn’t been looking for perfection... Rainbows came from clouds, didn’t they? If the day was too perfect, there would be none. But alone... He had never been.
A hand reached for his, warm and strong and he squeezed it.
In his mind he could see the summer day, wind moving the swings in the park. Yunjee laughing as she ran, and Nala close on her heels. And behind them both a little boy, Yunjoong, a sturdy child running in his scuttle-y toddler run to keep up.
He leaned in to Siwon’s laugh, and received a warm kiss to his cheek.
He knew it wasn’t real, that scene. Not yet. Even as he came half into consciousness and realized Siwon was climbing into bed, and he breathed through the twinge of pain in his side.
“Sorry for waking you,” Siwon whispered, kissing him as he settled beside him. He felt most comfortable with Siwon beside him, and rested his hand over the one Siwon had laid on his chest. “Love you. Sleep.”
“Love you, too,” he murmured. And relaxed, with Siwon beside him. They would find the rainbows together.
Maybe that summer day wasn’t real today. But he didn’t have any doubts it would be...
***
Henry sat in the airport, listening to the stream of English around him. It still seemed odd now, to hear it, as though he were living in some sort of alternate universe. His two years in Korea changing even the way he perceived his own language. And though there were people bustling around, his eyes were sharp, seeking out a familiar face in the milling crowd.
He and Donghae had nearly worn off their fingertips emailing over the past three days. To escape suspicion, he had left first with Donghae to follow after it was suggested he get out of the country for a while until things were settled. He didn’t mind taking Donghae away at all... Even if it meant leaving the bookstore and the friends he had made there.
He realized he couldn’t exactly sleep with Donghae in his parents’ house. But maybe they could borrow a car... Take a road trip. Somewhere. Anywhere. Halifax, Prince Edward Island. Show Donghae part of his country, and make it part of Donghae as Korea was now a part of him.
He stood, his heart tight and eyes watchful as the baggage claim began to turn and people began to gather from the international flight from Korea. Donghae...
***
“I guess my dad is going back to China tomorrow,” Kyuhyun told Zhou Mi, shifting so Zhou Mi’s hip wasn’t quite so on top of his as Zhou Mi sank onto the couch beside him.
“What do you think of that?” Zhou Mi asked, leaning close despite the shifting.
“I want to say good riddance. Like what could I ever gain from trusting him again. He obviously doesn’t want to stick around,” he said, but knew there was more. “I don’t even know if he likes me all that much. I don’t know why I bother worrying.”
“Because you care, Kui Xian. And it’s easy to see why if you know anything about you. I think it’s okay to be curious. There are things you know now that you never did before.”
“Do the things I know make that much difference? Why he left...He still left.”
“He did... And he’s leaving again. Is that what’s hard for you?” Zhou Mi asked, and paused when Kyuhyun didn’t answer. “Maybe it would be good to see him off at the airport. Get some sense of closure. You don’t have to pretend you’re sorry to see him go, but at least you would know that you did it.”
“I don’t know how to forgive him for all the lies and the years apart. I don’t know how.”
“It takes time. But if you want to, I think for some of it you can. There are always choices. Don’t push yourself, Kui Xian. Your heart will tell you what you need to do.”
“And his thoughts about me?”
“His son is grown up, is happy and healthy and successful... I don’t know how he couldn’t be proud of you.”
“And you’re such an impartial judge of that, too.”
He turned, resting his head facing Zhou Mi’s on the back of the couch.
“I’ll go. I don’t know what I’ll say... But if it’s the last time I see him, I at least want to say goodbye. I don’t want to regret not going. If I regret going then I promise I won’t hold you back, and you can beat him up for me.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes shone with his acceptance of that. The more he thought about it, the more he wanted to go. It would be his choice, under his control. Something he had been denied for a long time. Maybe it really would be the last time he saw his father. He couldn’t run away from it. Not now.
“And you’ll go with me?” he asked Zhou Mi as the man squirmed closer with a gleam in his eye.
“Of course, Kui Xian.”
Zhou Mi’s tongue swirled in the hollow between his collar bones. His hand tightened on Zhou Mi’s shoulder, breath hitching as Zhou Mi blew gently on his skin.
“What...what are you doing?”
“Hmm. Loving you.”
“Oh. On the couch? Seriously?”
Zhou Mi chuckled, pushing the shirt up Kyuhyun’s stomach with one hand.
“Seriously.” He paused, meeting Kyuhyun’s eyes. “Well. Maybe not here. But somewhere. If you...want?”
“I...” He scooted down, pulling Zhou Mi closer over him. “I want.”
“You want... What do you want?”
He ran a tender finger across Zhou Mi’s lips.
“You. Everything.” He bit his lip for a moment before they quirked in humor. “Ready when you are.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes closed briefly.
“I love you.”
“I know,” he said, gently kissing that mouth. “I love you, too.”
Zhou Mi chuckled and pulled him up by both hands, his full height to his advantage as he stepped forward, forcing Kyuhyun to step back.
Ah, now this was an awkward dance, he thought, glancing back over his shoulder at the clear path behind him. Zhou Mi’s hands on him wouldn’t let him turn around, guiding him back, back through the door frame, stopping just short of the bed. All of the air rushed out of him as he was pushed back, hitting nearly halfway up the bed before he bounced.
He wasn’t sure if his sudden vertigo was from the movement of the mattress, or from Zhou Mi’s mouth, hard and hot on his.
“What are you…”
“Be quiet,” Zhou Mi ordered.
He mewled in surprise as Zhou Mi’s teeth fastened on his neck. There was a harsh exhale from the other man.
“Changed my mind. Keep making that noise.”
Where had this come from, he wondered dimly, this self-assured, take-charge person? He should have seen it… The relentless pursuit to see the books, the relentless pursuit of him… Zhou Mi got what he wanted.
Of course, he pondered as his thighs closed around Zhou Mi’s hips, it didn’t mean he had to just lay back and give it to him.
***
His cheek stuck somewhat uncomfortably to the damp skin of Zhou Mi’s shoulder. It was perhaps a bit like running a marathon, if marathons ended as well as this one. He would be relaxed, but for his still thumping heart.
“I knew you’d be good,” Zhou Mi wheezed rather impressively. “The second I heard your name.”
“Liar,” Kyuhyun retorted. “You thought I was some bald old fat guy who hadn’t seen sunlight for the last 20 years.”
“Then from the first time I saw you.”
“That makes more sense,” he agreed. “You decided to hang around to see if you could get into my pants.”
He sighed as Zhou Mi’s fingers threaded through his hair.
“Too bad I fell in love with you first, huh?”
“Yeah,” Kyuhyun said, sighing again as he finally found a comfortable spot. “Too bad.”
***
The first sensation Kyuhyun noticed was his eyelids being kissed. And someone laughing at his scrunched up face.
“Ugh?” he said, in some semblance of morning speech.
“Good morning... I woke you up... You might need a little extra time getting ready today. Shower and all.”
His eyes creaked open, gravitating to the lips hanging so temptingly near his face.
“Mm, right. Shower.”
“I’ll go with you. Save time.”
“I think that you showering with me won’t save either of us time.”
“Let’s find out.”
He flipped through the picture album that Zhou Mi’s mother had sent home with them as Zhou Mi finished getting ready. It was odd how there were moments in life captured to see so many years later.
The first picture he ever saw of himself and Zhou Mi? Had been taken by Heechul, of course. On the day they had began to talk of dramas in the back room, just before Heechul’s interruption. In the picture he leaned over the arm of the old chair, clearly relishing whatever was coming out of his mouth mid-speech. Zhou Mi’s face had a silly intimate grin as he leaned in close...One that he really didn’t remember in retrospect, but Zhou Mi assured him it had been because he was so happy to hear Kyuhyun’s voice when he was speaking to him and not turning him away.
Everything really had started in that back room. All from that spot at the worktable that shouted “Zhou Mi belongs here!” Granted, maybe they hadn’t kissed for the first time back there, but one night when the doors were locked and the lights off, they... Well. That was a different story entirely...
The morning had gone well, he thought, closing the book as Zhou Mi tossed his sweater at him. If the small incident of him accidentally dropping the half-full shampoo bottle on a yelping Zhou Mi’s foot was disregarded.
“I’m just trying to get you clean everywhere,” he had gasped out, laughing too hard at Zhou Mi’s wounded expression to attempt normal speech.
“Kui Xian,” Zhou Mi said in a very censuring tone.
“I’ll kiss it better,” he promised, and pressed his lips to Zhou Mi’s.
***
They arrived at the airport an hour earlier than when they assumed his father would, tucked together on a bench against the wall. They people-watched, speaking softly as they watched couples, families go by. Some with leisure, some with speed. Some day they would take a trip together like these people... Somewhere, anywhere. Europe, the United States. China.
It was hard to say which of them spotted his father first, both stiffening and turning to the other. They stood together.
“I need to do this myself,” he said, searching Zhou Mi’s eyes to see if he understood.
Of course. Of course he did.
“I know, Kui Xian,” Zhou Mi said with a smile, and reaching up to touch his cheek. “I’ll be here.”
He deserved the biggest, tightest hug in the universe for that, Kyuhyun decided, breath blowing out through his teeth slowly as he walked to the man he had come to see. They stood facing each other, awkward, for a long moment.
“So, you’re going,” Kyuhyun said lamely.
“Yeah,” his father said. “I figure if I come back to Korea, someone might make it permanent. So I guess this is goodbye for good.”
There had been no talk of “goodbye for good” ten years ago. It had seemed just like any other goodbye. It was hard to contemplate after all this time that he would be saying goodbye again, when the answers he had, he realized, were not the ones he really wanted. He knew why this man had left, but not who he was. What kind of a person was he, and how had that shaped Kyuhyun? Kyuhyun thought of what Zhou Mi had been telling him before, of the choices in life.
“Zhou Mi says he’ll have to show me around Beijing before he decides to keep me. So who knows.”
He looked away from the shimmer of tears in his father’s eyes. That gratitude, he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do with that, yet. Probably wouldn’t, for a while.
“Make sure that kid takes good care of you.”
“Like he could help it. Thanks...” Kyuhyun cleared his throat. “Thanks for sending him, you know?”
“Yeah. I know. Be happy, son.”
“Don’t worry. I am.”
They said goodbye with a handshake this time instead of a hug. Adult to adult, man to man. This time, both of them aware of all the nuances of this goodbye. He was taller than his father, he realized. And despite everything there was that connection of son to father. He had loved this man once. Had been loved in return. And he had much of his life stretching out in front of him to figure out what to make of it.
He walked toward the exit, feeling lighter as he reached out, took the waiting hand of Zhou Mi.
“You okay?” Zhou Mi asked, dipping his head down so that they were almost on a level with each other.
“Yeah, thanks,” he said, and actually felt it was true. He squeezed Zhou Mi’s hand. “Hey, you know you make me happy, right?”
“You make me happy, too, Kui Xian.”
He felt like his smile perfectly answered Zhou Mi’s. It was funny, it seemed it always had.
“Let’s get going... I’m starving!” They turned towards the car and he studied Zhou Mi’s profile. “Who’s not cooking tonight?”
“That would be you,” Zhou Mi informed him archly. There was to be no sneaky getting out of his dinner turn tonight. “Do you have that noodle place we tried last week still in your phone? Maybe they could have it ready by the time we get there.”
His stomach growled loudly at the thought, and, with a laugh, he let Zhou Mi lead him home.
***
***
The End
***
***
And the beginning. :) First of all, I have to thank all of you... Truly each and every one of you. You never know what you'll get handed... But I've really felt happy to have been on this journey. <3
I've created a resource post with some additional thanks and geeky things and me rambling...and a little preview for a fic I hope to inflate off the ground that'll pick up after this story for HenHae. I can hear my head rattle over here...
Other than that... Again, thank you. <3
Author: Coley Merrin
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Zhou Mi/Kyuhyun and Siwon/Hankyung (with possible additions)
Genre: AU. Drama/Romance/Angst/Fluff/The kitchen sink
Summary: The bookstore called "Soulmate" has been the most important thing in Kyuhyun's life. With it, he has built a fortress of brick and page around himself, one that can only be brought down from the inside -- both with love and with danger.
Hankyung has built a life of meaning, but finds no substance in it and lives in dreams. Dreams that, when they materialize, make him question his ability to reach and hold on when he wants nothing less.
***
Chapter One ** Chapter Two ** Chapter Three ** Chapter Four ** Chapter Five ** Chapter Six ** Chapter Seven ** Chapter Eight ** Chapter Nine ** Chapter Ten **
Chapter Eleven ** Chapter Twelve ** Chapter Thirteen ** Chapter Fourteen ** Chapter Fifteen ** Chapter Sixteen ** Chapter Seventeen ** Chapter Eighteen ** Chapter Nineteen ** Chapter Twenty ** Chapter Twenty One ** Chapter Twenty Two ** Chapter Twenty Three ** Chapter Twenty Four ** Extended Scenes (Smutty Extras)
Sequel: Forever
***
Chapter Twenty Four
***
For Kyuhyun the dam had finally broken at home, letting go with wrenching sobs against Zhou Mi and feeling the answering gasps against him. Both of them reacting not only to the letdown of the stress of the day, but to the reaction of each other. The feel of the the heavy book in his hands, feeling it thud off of the gunman’s head... Hearing Siwon’s desperate order for an ambulance. Seeing Hankyung on the floor... In the hospital bed.
“I’m so glad the police have those men, and we don’t have to worry about them out there...somewhere,” he told Zhou Mi when he could talk. He wanted to bang his head on the wall. He really hated to cry...
“I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like if we didn’t know where they were,” Zhou Mi said, agreeing with him wholeheartedly.
Zhou Mi stroked his back as they undressed. All he wanted was the shower, and to sleep. Maybe he would wake up tomorrow and it would all be better.
Zhou Mi let him into the shower first, cuddling him from behind, resting his chin on Kyuhyun’s shoulder.
He shivered despite the hot water, turning to lift his face to Zhou Mi’s for a kiss.
“It could have been you,” he whispered. “Any of us. But it could have been you. Not just hurt but...”
“But it wasn’t. And Hankyung will be just as good as new. You were amazing today, you know that? Wielding that book, even after that idiot hit you.” Zhou Mi ran a gentle thumb along the edge of Kyuhyun’s lip. “I don’t think I could have done that.”
Kyuhyun snorted. “You can’t even kill a spider.”
“You’re right. I can only love you.”
Zhou Mi’s arms tightened around him and he shook his head. “That’s not true. I felt you with me, beside me, supporting me today. If I hit that man, so did you. Because I didn’t do that alone. Why are you still here, after all of this?”
“Because you don’t run away on the people you love. And I love you, Kui Xian. I love you till it hurts. Darling... I need you. I’ll smile for you.”
He could have rolled his eyes at the ridiculous lines, but he wanted that smile and he got it. A wide smile just for him.
It was not desire so much that led them to touch, but the need to remember they were alive.
They crawled into bed, relishing the feel of skin against skin. Real and solid and close, his Zhou Mi. He felt utterly drained. They whispered words of love, barely voicing it as Zhou Mi stroked his hair.
He had never been more secure in the knowledge that this was love. He and Zhou Mi had found that. Zhou Mi seemed to suit his quirks, filling where he could not.
“Zhou Mi,” he whispered.
“Hm?”
He shook his head. It was only to know he was there.
***
He was half dressed after talking to Siwon on the phone to make sure Hankyung was still okay before his resolve gave out. He crawled back under the covers and squished against the heat-radiating Zhou Mi, purring as he pressed his chilly feet to Zhou Mi’s nice, warm legs.
There was a short scuffle, which he won, oozing into a half sleep while buried in Zhou Mi’s neck.
“Put socks on before you get back into bed,” Zhou Mi chided straight into his ear.
“Mm, warm,” he murmured.
“Kiss me, Kui Xian.”
“Definitely shouldn’t have gotten back into bed...”
“I’m glad you did,” Zhou Mi said sweetly, kissing along his jaw.
He traced Zhou Mi’s cheekbone. “Now I really know I shouldn’t... Hey!”
But he wasn’t laughing as Zhou Mi pulled him on top of him, kissing him generously.
They jerked against each other as someone knocked on the apartment door. Zhou Mi’s eyes were wide as they stared at each other, frozen.
“Oh! It could be the police!” he said, pulling himself toward the edge of the bed.
“It could be anyone else, too!” Zhou Mi yelped, scooting after him. “I’m coming with you.”
“You’re naked. You can’t answer the door naked. The police frown on that.”
“I can if it’s you going to the door by yourself. I’ll get pants.” Zhou Mi grabbed the closest thing that resembled pants as Kyuhyun pulled down his shirt and bee-lined for the door. He could hear Zhou Mi tugging his clothes on and racing after him as he rushed for the entrance.
It was definitely not the police, he realized as he opened the door with Zhou Mi right behind him. But it was very much his father.
***
Zhou Mi eased to the side, quick motions indicating that Kyuhyun should let him inside, and that he would call the police.
He let his father inside reluctantly. Every cell in his body wanted to send him away, erase his existence from anywhere near him. But he couldn’t Not for Hankyung, or for Zhou Mi, or Siwon, or the children... All of them deserved answers that this one...person could provide.
“If you’re coming over to express your condolences for Hankyung being shot,” he said, shutting the door and crossing his arms, “you’re about a hundred years late.”
“What?!” his father asked, looking genuinely startled. “Who was shot? Where?”
“Don’t act as though you know nothing about it. It’s insulting.”
“It’s not insulting when I don’t know anything. I haven’t even been around Seoul in days. Seriously, what happened?”
He felt Zhou Mi come up beside him.
“It was at the store. Two men with guns came in looking for you. And my friend, Hankyung, he was shot. Just like I told you.”
“Is that what happened to your face?”
He probed his sore lip, having forgotten about it, and feeling the ache in it from Zhou Mi’s kisses.
“Yeah, it is. Seems like they wanted to find you pretty badly. Now tell me how to fix that.”
“Hankyung... That’s your Chinese friend? Your mother told me a little about him. Didn’t like you spending so much time with him. Seems you like Chinese men,” he said, glancing at Zhou Mi, who tightened his hand on Kyuhyun’s arm.
But Kyuhyun had heard something in there that didn’t make sense.
“Mom? You talked to mom? I didn’t even meet Hankyung until after you left.”
“I called home every month to make sure you didn’t need anything. You were still my son whether I was there or not.”
“She... She never told me you called.”
He wondered what else she hadn’t told him. What else he hadn’t known. He had been a teenager when his father had gone. He hadn’t been that young. He could have dealt with it. He could have...
“Probably didn’t want you to get your hopes up that I would come home,” his father said, with apology in his voice. “There wasn’t any chance of that.”
He opened his mouth to deny that it would have ever crossed his mind to think of that, but his father frowned at him.
“How long did it take you to stop waiting? I know. I missed you, too. What do you want from me, Kyuhyun? I’ll do what I can for you. I came back to Korea hoping I could... I know at the root of this I am at fault. But you’re still my son.”
“Tell me who sent the gunmen. Who ordered people to break into my apartment, and Zhou Mi’s. Who set the fire. Who was responsible for this... All of this.”
His father seemed to think a moment. “You called the police when I arrived? Good. Because I can tell you that. I can tell you who was behind everything that has happened.”
All of the information they had been missing, the whos and the whys, had been sewed up inside of his father’s absence. His father had sent Zhou Mi to check to see the state of Kyuhyun’s book collection. And it had gotten him nowhere. How ironic that his actions in sending Zhou Mi had started this whole cascade...
***
It was tense waiting for the police to arrive, sitting in one of their kitchen chairs in silence as he waited for Zhou Mi to dress. They’d had a short, tense discuss over whether Zhou Mi should leave Kyuhyun alone with his father.
“He’s not going to attack me with you fifteen feet away,” he whispered, pushing on Zhou Mi’s stomach. “Just don’t close the door all the way or something.”
When Zhou Mi had returned, they had switched places, hands sliding against each other’s as they passed. When he had gone back into the living room, feeling quite a bit more girded with socks and a better shirt, Zhou Mi was somewhat easily conversing old books and Chinese trends with his father.
It was still bizarre to think, even after all this time and all the times he had already considered it, that Zhou Mi knew his father. That they could have conversations, history. How different, this situation, that him meeting Zhou Mi’s family. Such a different amount of expectation and an absence of joy. He didn’t think he was supposed to feel ill, seeing Zhou Mi, innocent and dear, so near to someone who betrayed him.
It was deliberate that he sat beside Zhou Mi, positioning them both against his father as the police talked with him.
Somehow he still ended up asking questions.
“The police have the men who held up the store. But this woman... If she’s behind it, how do we get her?” he asked.
“Give her what she wants,” his father said.
“What is that?”
“She must want the book. Her men though... If that’s who attacked the store, maybe they’ll give her up.”
“Why? The book was yours. What did you do?”
Somehow he knew without being told.
“It was never mine. Not really. I knew they were shady people... Loaning money to people and extracting it in ways you can’t imagine. But I helped them obtain books... I saw that one there. It was...pristine. Amazing. Everything I had ever worked for. I could never afford to buy it.”
“So you stole it? Then you lied to me.”
“To keep you safe! It was our secret.”
“So when you left they thought you took it with you. And that’s why I couldn’t tell Mom.”
Years of lies upon lies. Swearing to his mother the only books of his father’s in the building were below.
“You just raised their suspicions by letting this punk,” his father said, inclining his head in a genial way toward Zhou Mi, “stay as long as you did. If he had written about the book, they really would have known. They sent me pictures of you, thinking I’d crack.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? Why did someone have to get shot before you tell me this? I’d have traded all of them to keep that bullet out of Hankyung. He has children. You made us live in fear for a decade all because of one book that you didn’t even keep!”
“I never thought it would happen like that.”
“Why didn’t they come after the store? They could have stolen our home and everything in it from us.”
“I don’t mean to say that I feel I did anything better in taking the book because she killed to get it,” his father said. “But I wanted no part in fighting or seeing someone get hurt.”
“They why did you leave instead of giving it back?” Kyuhyun butted in.
“They thought I still had it when I left. And I did leave because...Because they nearly killed you to make me give it back.”
Kyuhyun searched his memory before his father laid it out in short, quick details. He remembered the broken flesh on his elbow and his father’s frightened face more than he remembered the acute fear of nearly getting run over, of hearing the car speed away.
“Because it was always about the book,” he said, resigned.
All the things that had happened when he was young had never been coincidence. Not the fire, not his mother’s fear, or his father’s absence.
But even knowing that, it was surreal to sit and listen to his father detail how he had stolen a book from the mistress of a crime lord. To imagine back to that time, when his father was gone long hours consulting... To know all of those memories had been leading to this.
***
His father had left with the police, not under arrest because they had no evidence of any crime, but to continue giving them information. It gave him the chance to go to the store, to enter it for the first time since the shooting. It was bright, smelled of Ryeowook’s coffee cake and books, and Ryeowook was hugging him immediately.
“I called the hospital. Sounds like Hankyung spent an easy night.”
“Yeah, thank goodness,” he said wearily. As soon as the day was over, Zhou Mi would pick him up and they would go to see him. And hopefully some of the tension would drop from him. Henry came in, concerned about Hankyung, and all continued as usual. If ignoring a bullet hole in the counter was usual.
The three of them gathered around the counter when the police walked in, eager for any news. To hear the details of the vague information his father had given that morning was startling.
“The two men who held up the store used to work for one of the most prolific crime lords in the city,” the detective said. “We’ve been trying to nail him for ages. When he and his mistress split a year ago or so, their patterns changed... We suspect those two men went with her during the split instead, either by orders or by choice. Our informants weren’t privy to that information. This is a picture we have of them...”
Kyuhyun jerked, as Henry loudly exclaimed, “No!”
The police were sharp to the reaction. “Do you recognize someone here?”
“Lee...” He pointed to the leader’s picture. “I don’t know what his name is. He loans money to people?”
“Among other things. He’s been involved with smuggling, loan sharking, for a number of years. But he’s smart. We’ve never been able to pin him down. How do you know him?”
“My...friend borrowed money from him. I think. He’s afraid of the man. I never knew... I never guessed...”
“Did he know you worked for Mr. Cho?”
“No...?”
That seemed to satisfy them, but he wouldn’t meet Kyuhyun’s eyes, even as they stood to listen. Kyuhyun stared at the picture of this supposed crime lord and his mistress. Even Henry had been touched by this.
This woman who had been behind everything. He could have lost his friends, his livelihood. And this woman, slender and still young looking, who had been involved in the killing of her own family... She could have walked into the door, talked with him or Ryeowook or Henry. And none of them would have known. He could have put her books in a bag, answered a compliment to the animals Zhou Mi had given him.
“She won’t be able to do this again?” he asked the detective.
“We’ll see to it.”
***
Donghae’s “uncle” couldn’t have known where Henry had worked... There had been that one time that Donghae had lied to his uncle about where Henry worked, as though... As though Donghae had been trying to keep him from that knowledge.
And they had talked about Kyuhyun and his books more than once. Donghae had been so interested. And come to find out that his “uncle’s” men... His “uncle’s” mistress’s men had been behind everything?
Donghae cringed as Henry threw open the door.
“Did you know?” he asked, trembling with he knew not what. Anger? Fear? “Did you know something was going to happen at the bookstore?”
“I didn’t!” Donghae insisted. “I didn’t. I... I hoped nothing would happen, ever. When Ryeowook called... Knowing he had been here with us. He made us his alibis. I can’t...”
“If you know anything, come with me so you can tell someone. Those are my friends. One of them could have died. All of them could have. There were kids there. One of them is the cutest little girl you can imagine. She had to watch one of her fathers bleed while the other worried. You have to tell someone.”
Donghae’s eyes widened. “There were kids there?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll tell what I know... Henry, I swear I didn’t mean...” Donghae’s words trailed off before he spoke again softly. “They won’t like it if they find out.”
“I’ll protect you,” Henry said, laughed a bit at Donghae’s incredulous look. “You’re doing the right thing. Thank you, Donghae.”
“I went over there they day after the shooting. My uncle laughed when one of his men told him she might be arrested. Saying it served her right for taking the weakest ones. I didn’t really think anything about it when they asked me to hang around, keep an eye out on the bookstore in my free time. They never really told me what they were doing. Thought I would talk too much. I didn’t realize they wanted me to look in on what she was doing.”
“You... You never went to the bookstore after we met,” Henry said, confused.
“I know... They’d ask me things about the store, and I’d just tell them whatever you’d told me about your day. Nothing happened, or friends had stopped by...”
“From me? You were feeding them information from me? So when you asked about Kyuhyun and the books? Oh! That night you told me your cousin was curious?”
“They asked me. I didn’t want them to know I hadn’t been going to the store like they asked, so... I swear that was the only thing I asked you that they wanted. I didn’t want to go to the store... I didn’t figure I’d meet...someone like you. I just wanted to spend time with you. I told you as much as I knew. Just not who they were. I never wanted to hide it from you. I wanted to spend time with you.”
It was something he could believe. Kind-hearted Donghae.
“I was going to leave Korea.”
Henry’s heart tightened. “What?”
“The beginning of the school quarter when I met you. I was leaving. I didn’t care where. I had fake papers, and I was going to sell my father’s watch to get enough for a plane ticket. It was safest, right after the start of a quarter, when they thought I was settling in. I was going to get away and never come back. I didn’t want anything to do with them. And then... Then I knocked you down in the store. And you looked up at me? I couldn’t get you out of my head. And then you were in my class. It was an accident. I was supposed to get information at Soulmate, not to hang out with you.”
“I don’t think it was an accident, Donghae,” he said, staring at the scarred table.
“No, Henry, no, you have to believe me,” Donghae said, covering Henry’s hands with his, voice panicked. “I swear I had no idea you were in the class. I had a huge crush on you. I swear it was real. I swear, Henry...”
“No!” Henry said, interrupting Donghae, the relief trickling through him at Donghae’s heartfelt insistence. He knew it, was glad that he had heard it. Felt bad that he had let Donghae continue as long as he had. “I mean that I don’t think it was an accident because... Do you believe in fate? You meeting me might have freed you. It wasn’t an accident. It was your salvation.”
“Henry,” Donghae breathed, eyes tearing.
“You would have told me if you had known something was going to happen. Told someone. I know you love me. And those are my friends. They’ll love you because I love you.”
Donghae hands tightened over Henry’s, and his tears dropped heavily onto the table.
“I owed them more than I could pay back. I started doing little jobs for them, just fetching or delivering, anything to try and work down my debt. I knew they weren’t good people. But my dad didn’t have any choice at the time. He planned on being able to pay them back himself.”
Henry listened as Donghae told him everything. Everything he wanted Henry to know first.
And his eyes widened when Donghae’s smile sharpened, a gleam of satisfaction in his eyes. “I’m already feeding information to the police. I started the day after you met my uncle. My uncle. I’ll look forward to not having to say that any more.”
He listened as Donghae called his police contact, told him everything he had just told Henry. And wondered where it would take them next.
***
Kyuhyun and Zhou Mi went every day to see Hankyung at the hospital. Siwon or his mother could be found, baby in arm, at his bedside at almost any hour. And Hankyung had begun to look more like himself again.
They were there for the day Hankyung was wheeled out, taking the baby steps from the wheelchair to sit in the passenger side of the car to go home. How Hankyung had been flustered at the cheers, and the smacking kiss Siwon had planted on him.
Kyuhyun had looked up at the hospital that had made sure Hankyung would stay with them, and realized he really didn’t mind if he didn’t see it again for a while.
With the information his father had provided as leverage, the gunmen had talked, laying out everything they knew of this woman’s involvement. How they had been paid, instructed, to break in, to set the fire. Things designed to scare Kyuhyun and his father into giving up.
The woman wasn’t quite sane, he realized, frowning down at the simple package in his hands. She wanted to see the book when she was arrested. That was all she had asked. To see the book. She had killed her own father to own it. Such a small book that had caused so much trouble. That had nearly cost the life of his oldest friend. And because there was no trail, no real owner that could be found, the book had come back to him.
There was a museum out there, somewhere, that would cherish it. Zhou Mi could help him choose one. They could be done with it once and for all.
And now that the woman would be put in prison, there would be no more danger. No more break ins. No more sleepless nights. Yes, they had to catch the man who had trained those gunmen, but he had no ties to the store. With this... With this he was free.
***
Siwon settled onto the bed with Geng, pulling a slender hand to his mouth and pressing gentle kisses to each finger. It was...amazing to see him back in their bed, in their room. It was like he was truly coming home when they had come slowly up the front stairs, pulling up the plush chair so that Geng could rest after his strenuous trip home. Yunjoong was with Geng’s mother until Yunjee was out of school so that they could have this time alone together, just the two of them. They had chatted while Siwon prepared lunch for him, cuddled during an afternoon nap.
And now here they were...
“How are you feeling?”
“Tired. Sore. The usual. But not bad, all in all. Don’t worry, Siwon. I’m okay...”
He ran his hand gently over the perfect stomach, one gentle curve to the other, stopping short of the bandage covering the angry, healing welt.
“Not quite as attractive any more, is it?” Geng asked, and Siwon glared.
“You could have a hundred of these and still be the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”
He gave a breathy laugh, even that a source of pain from the look on his face, and tugged Siwon down.
“I’d rather not have a hundred bullet holes,” he said against Siwon’s cheek. “But thank you for the offer anyway. When I’m old and flabby and wrinkly, I guess it won’t stand out quite as much.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he said, kissing Hankyung gently. “I’ll still love you then anyway. I meant forever, Geng. You can’t leave me before then.”
Hankyung let his hand be taken, and twined his fingers with Siwon’s.
“You and I and the kids will live together forever,” Siwon said, sounding very positive of this fact.
“You realize, right,” Hankyung asked, “that they’ll grow up and move away and get married?”
“Now that’s crazy talk.”
“But even then, you’ll still have me.”
A tiny wail was heard through the static of the baby monitor, and Hankyung turned his head toward it, gauging the intensity of the cry.
“Sounds like the little prince is awake and hungry.”
“I’ll go check on him. And Geng... We’ll have each other.”
He talked to Yunjoong as he changed his diaper, knowing both the baby and Geng could hear him. He knew it would make Geng smile.
Siwon fed Yunjoong his bottle in the chair beside their bed, the tiny, baby hands opening and closing as he ate with greedy fervor. He had looked in on Yunjee, who was sprawled and deeply sleeping. Geng had fallen asleep before he had returned, and Siwon was glad for that, glad to see him healing. Even when sleeping he had a smile.
***
Hankyung dreamed he was alone for the first time in a long time, ready to jerk himself out of sleep even at the possibility. They had joked of rainbows, he and Kyuhyun. He hadn’t been looking for perfection... Rainbows came from clouds, didn’t they? If the day was too perfect, there would be none. But alone... He had never been.
A hand reached for his, warm and strong and he squeezed it.
In his mind he could see the summer day, wind moving the swings in the park. Yunjee laughing as she ran, and Nala close on her heels. And behind them both a little boy, Yunjoong, a sturdy child running in his scuttle-y toddler run to keep up.
He leaned in to Siwon’s laugh, and received a warm kiss to his cheek.
He knew it wasn’t real, that scene. Not yet. Even as he came half into consciousness and realized Siwon was climbing into bed, and he breathed through the twinge of pain in his side.
“Sorry for waking you,” Siwon whispered, kissing him as he settled beside him. He felt most comfortable with Siwon beside him, and rested his hand over the one Siwon had laid on his chest. “Love you. Sleep.”
“Love you, too,” he murmured. And relaxed, with Siwon beside him. They would find the rainbows together.
Maybe that summer day wasn’t real today. But he didn’t have any doubts it would be...
***
Henry sat in the airport, listening to the stream of English around him. It still seemed odd now, to hear it, as though he were living in some sort of alternate universe. His two years in Korea changing even the way he perceived his own language. And though there were people bustling around, his eyes were sharp, seeking out a familiar face in the milling crowd.
He and Donghae had nearly worn off their fingertips emailing over the past three days. To escape suspicion, he had left first with Donghae to follow after it was suggested he get out of the country for a while until things were settled. He didn’t mind taking Donghae away at all... Even if it meant leaving the bookstore and the friends he had made there.
He realized he couldn’t exactly sleep with Donghae in his parents’ house. But maybe they could borrow a car... Take a road trip. Somewhere. Anywhere. Halifax, Prince Edward Island. Show Donghae part of his country, and make it part of Donghae as Korea was now a part of him.
He stood, his heart tight and eyes watchful as the baggage claim began to turn and people began to gather from the international flight from Korea. Donghae...
***
“I guess my dad is going back to China tomorrow,” Kyuhyun told Zhou Mi, shifting so Zhou Mi’s hip wasn’t quite so on top of his as Zhou Mi sank onto the couch beside him.
“What do you think of that?” Zhou Mi asked, leaning close despite the shifting.
“I want to say good riddance. Like what could I ever gain from trusting him again. He obviously doesn’t want to stick around,” he said, but knew there was more. “I don’t even know if he likes me all that much. I don’t know why I bother worrying.”
“Because you care, Kui Xian. And it’s easy to see why if you know anything about you. I think it’s okay to be curious. There are things you know now that you never did before.”
“Do the things I know make that much difference? Why he left...He still left.”
“He did... And he’s leaving again. Is that what’s hard for you?” Zhou Mi asked, and paused when Kyuhyun didn’t answer. “Maybe it would be good to see him off at the airport. Get some sense of closure. You don’t have to pretend you’re sorry to see him go, but at least you would know that you did it.”
“I don’t know how to forgive him for all the lies and the years apart. I don’t know how.”
“It takes time. But if you want to, I think for some of it you can. There are always choices. Don’t push yourself, Kui Xian. Your heart will tell you what you need to do.”
“And his thoughts about me?”
“His son is grown up, is happy and healthy and successful... I don’t know how he couldn’t be proud of you.”
“And you’re such an impartial judge of that, too.”
He turned, resting his head facing Zhou Mi’s on the back of the couch.
“I’ll go. I don’t know what I’ll say... But if it’s the last time I see him, I at least want to say goodbye. I don’t want to regret not going. If I regret going then I promise I won’t hold you back, and you can beat him up for me.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes shone with his acceptance of that. The more he thought about it, the more he wanted to go. It would be his choice, under his control. Something he had been denied for a long time. Maybe it really would be the last time he saw his father. He couldn’t run away from it. Not now.
“And you’ll go with me?” he asked Zhou Mi as the man squirmed closer with a gleam in his eye.
“Of course, Kui Xian.”
Zhou Mi’s tongue swirled in the hollow between his collar bones. His hand tightened on Zhou Mi’s shoulder, breath hitching as Zhou Mi blew gently on his skin.
“What...what are you doing?”
“Hmm. Loving you.”
“Oh. On the couch? Seriously?”
Zhou Mi chuckled, pushing the shirt up Kyuhyun’s stomach with one hand.
“Seriously.” He paused, meeting Kyuhyun’s eyes. “Well. Maybe not here. But somewhere. If you...want?”
“I...” He scooted down, pulling Zhou Mi closer over him. “I want.”
“You want... What do you want?”
He ran a tender finger across Zhou Mi’s lips.
“You. Everything.” He bit his lip for a moment before they quirked in humor. “Ready when you are.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes closed briefly.
“I love you.”
“I know,” he said, gently kissing that mouth. “I love you, too.”
Zhou Mi chuckled and pulled him up by both hands, his full height to his advantage as he stepped forward, forcing Kyuhyun to step back.
Ah, now this was an awkward dance, he thought, glancing back over his shoulder at the clear path behind him. Zhou Mi’s hands on him wouldn’t let him turn around, guiding him back, back through the door frame, stopping just short of the bed. All of the air rushed out of him as he was pushed back, hitting nearly halfway up the bed before he bounced.
He wasn’t sure if his sudden vertigo was from the movement of the mattress, or from Zhou Mi’s mouth, hard and hot on his.
“What are you…”
“Be quiet,” Zhou Mi ordered.
He mewled in surprise as Zhou Mi’s teeth fastened on his neck. There was a harsh exhale from the other man.
“Changed my mind. Keep making that noise.”
Where had this come from, he wondered dimly, this self-assured, take-charge person? He should have seen it… The relentless pursuit to see the books, the relentless pursuit of him… Zhou Mi got what he wanted.
Of course, he pondered as his thighs closed around Zhou Mi’s hips, it didn’t mean he had to just lay back and give it to him.
***
His cheek stuck somewhat uncomfortably to the damp skin of Zhou Mi’s shoulder. It was perhaps a bit like running a marathon, if marathons ended as well as this one. He would be relaxed, but for his still thumping heart.
“I knew you’d be good,” Zhou Mi wheezed rather impressively. “The second I heard your name.”
“Liar,” Kyuhyun retorted. “You thought I was some bald old fat guy who hadn’t seen sunlight for the last 20 years.”
“Then from the first time I saw you.”
“That makes more sense,” he agreed. “You decided to hang around to see if you could get into my pants.”
He sighed as Zhou Mi’s fingers threaded through his hair.
“Too bad I fell in love with you first, huh?”
“Yeah,” Kyuhyun said, sighing again as he finally found a comfortable spot. “Too bad.”
***
The first sensation Kyuhyun noticed was his eyelids being kissed. And someone laughing at his scrunched up face.
“Ugh?” he said, in some semblance of morning speech.
“Good morning... I woke you up... You might need a little extra time getting ready today. Shower and all.”
His eyes creaked open, gravitating to the lips hanging so temptingly near his face.
“Mm, right. Shower.”
“I’ll go with you. Save time.”
“I think that you showering with me won’t save either of us time.”
“Let’s find out.”
He flipped through the picture album that Zhou Mi’s mother had sent home with them as Zhou Mi finished getting ready. It was odd how there were moments in life captured to see so many years later.
The first picture he ever saw of himself and Zhou Mi? Had been taken by Heechul, of course. On the day they had began to talk of dramas in the back room, just before Heechul’s interruption. In the picture he leaned over the arm of the old chair, clearly relishing whatever was coming out of his mouth mid-speech. Zhou Mi’s face had a silly intimate grin as he leaned in close...One that he really didn’t remember in retrospect, but Zhou Mi assured him it had been because he was so happy to hear Kyuhyun’s voice when he was speaking to him and not turning him away.
Everything really had started in that back room. All from that spot at the worktable that shouted “Zhou Mi belongs here!” Granted, maybe they hadn’t kissed for the first time back there, but one night when the doors were locked and the lights off, they... Well. That was a different story entirely...
The morning had gone well, he thought, closing the book as Zhou Mi tossed his sweater at him. If the small incident of him accidentally dropping the half-full shampoo bottle on a yelping Zhou Mi’s foot was disregarded.
“I’m just trying to get you clean everywhere,” he had gasped out, laughing too hard at Zhou Mi’s wounded expression to attempt normal speech.
“Kui Xian,” Zhou Mi said in a very censuring tone.
“I’ll kiss it better,” he promised, and pressed his lips to Zhou Mi’s.
***
They arrived at the airport an hour earlier than when they assumed his father would, tucked together on a bench against the wall. They people-watched, speaking softly as they watched couples, families go by. Some with leisure, some with speed. Some day they would take a trip together like these people... Somewhere, anywhere. Europe, the United States. China.
It was hard to say which of them spotted his father first, both stiffening and turning to the other. They stood together.
“I need to do this myself,” he said, searching Zhou Mi’s eyes to see if he understood.
Of course. Of course he did.
“I know, Kui Xian,” Zhou Mi said with a smile, and reaching up to touch his cheek. “I’ll be here.”
He deserved the biggest, tightest hug in the universe for that, Kyuhyun decided, breath blowing out through his teeth slowly as he walked to the man he had come to see. They stood facing each other, awkward, for a long moment.
“So, you’re going,” Kyuhyun said lamely.
“Yeah,” his father said. “I figure if I come back to Korea, someone might make it permanent. So I guess this is goodbye for good.”
There had been no talk of “goodbye for good” ten years ago. It had seemed just like any other goodbye. It was hard to contemplate after all this time that he would be saying goodbye again, when the answers he had, he realized, were not the ones he really wanted. He knew why this man had left, but not who he was. What kind of a person was he, and how had that shaped Kyuhyun? Kyuhyun thought of what Zhou Mi had been telling him before, of the choices in life.
“Zhou Mi says he’ll have to show me around Beijing before he decides to keep me. So who knows.”
He looked away from the shimmer of tears in his father’s eyes. That gratitude, he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do with that, yet. Probably wouldn’t, for a while.
“Make sure that kid takes good care of you.”
“Like he could help it. Thanks...” Kyuhyun cleared his throat. “Thanks for sending him, you know?”
“Yeah. I know. Be happy, son.”
“Don’t worry. I am.”
They said goodbye with a handshake this time instead of a hug. Adult to adult, man to man. This time, both of them aware of all the nuances of this goodbye. He was taller than his father, he realized. And despite everything there was that connection of son to father. He had loved this man once. Had been loved in return. And he had much of his life stretching out in front of him to figure out what to make of it.
He walked toward the exit, feeling lighter as he reached out, took the waiting hand of Zhou Mi.
“You okay?” Zhou Mi asked, dipping his head down so that they were almost on a level with each other.
“Yeah, thanks,” he said, and actually felt it was true. He squeezed Zhou Mi’s hand. “Hey, you know you make me happy, right?”
“You make me happy, too, Kui Xian.”
He felt like his smile perfectly answered Zhou Mi’s. It was funny, it seemed it always had.
“Let’s get going... I’m starving!” They turned towards the car and he studied Zhou Mi’s profile. “Who’s not cooking tonight?”
“That would be you,” Zhou Mi informed him archly. There was to be no sneaky getting out of his dinner turn tonight. “Do you have that noodle place we tried last week still in your phone? Maybe they could have it ready by the time we get there.”
His stomach growled loudly at the thought, and, with a laugh, he let Zhou Mi lead him home.
***
***
The End
***
***
And the beginning. :) First of all, I have to thank all of you... Truly each and every one of you. You never know what you'll get handed... But I've really felt happy to have been on this journey. <3
I've created a resource post with some additional thanks and geeky things and me rambling...and a little preview for a fic I hope to inflate off the ground that'll pick up after this story for HenHae. I can hear my head rattle over here...
Other than that... Again, thank you. <3