Sharing a Bed - Kris POV
Title: Sharing a Bed
Pairing: Tao/Kris
Rating: PG-13
Summary: [Companion to Difficult Thoughts] Kris struggles with his feelings for Tao that are all too prominent while sharing a bed.
Sharing a Bed
After being a trainee for years and being from a different country, Kris is definitely learned in the art of homesickness. Well, most of the time he is. When the ache for his family and friends back home starts to weigh on him he finds ways to distract himself. Dance harder. Practice singing and rapping more diligently. Eat comforting but healthy foods. To move forward he must not dwell on what his life used to be but where it is right now and how he wants it to go in the future.
Kris wants to be an idol star just as much as he misses his family. It would be nice if he could have both at the same time, but his family can’t exactly afford to drop everything and move to South Korea, nor would he really have the free time to visit them if they did. His schedule is strict and must be followed to a T if he wants to debut someday. It’s not like he’s lost his family anyways. They still keep in touch, just not as often as Kris would always like.
When Kris sees the new Chinese trainee waltz into the room he doesn’t peg him for a crier. He seems strong and disciplined. Perhaps even a tad dark. This kid definitely has good potential. After all the years of seeing trainees come and go from SM Entertainment, he is getting good at picking out the ones who’ll chicken out and the ones who will stick with it. Seeing as how Tao is going to be rooming with Yixing, Luhan, and himself, he decides to walk over to the new boy and get acquainted.
“Huang Zi Tao,” the younger boy introduces himself gently. The voice does not match the body, Kris decides.
“Wu Fan, I mean Kevin,” Kris introduces himself, a bit flustered.
“Kevin?” Tao hums. “Why not Wu Fan?” his gaze is curious, young, and unadulterated by life.
“Just… reasons,” Kris shrugs. He doesn’t yet realize that a few nights later, when Tao is sobbing in his arms, that he’ll be telling Tao exactly why he doesn’t want to be “Wu Fan” when he’s in Korea. It makes him miss his home way too much. When he is Wu Fan, he misses his family in Canada and in China. When he is just “Kevin”, he wills himself to only miss his direct family in Canada. It’s the small subtle barriers that he puts up to cope with his current life that always seem to help Tao cope with his. Telling Tao these little secrets about himself is the only way he can make Tao calm down and sleep instead of crying every night from homesickness.
At first, Kris doesn’t think much about how Tao always sneaks into his bed in the middle of the night when he can’t stop crying. By the fifth time Tao crawls into his bed with tears in his eyes Kris begins to wonder exactly why this kid always has to come to his bed. Tao is either a complete mush ball or maybe he likes him and uses homesickness as an excuse? No, Tao doesn’t like him. He can’t like him. He’s a man. Both of them are men. Kris only likes girls. He likes women with nice breasts that he can toy with and a vagina. Not a man with flat chest and a penis. But he does have nice abs, Kris thinks after several weeks of seeing the younger man shirtless.
Wait.
Nope.
He doesn’t want that… does he?
I mean, a man’s abs are clearly nothing like a woman’s breasts…but his body tells him otherwise when Tao sinks into his peaceful slumber every night after crying. Or at least his body starts to react the way it would to seeing a topless woman. After this realization, Kris tries to avoid seeing shirtless Tao as much as he possibly can, but it doesn’t always work. Sometimes Tao sleeps shirtless, and sometimes those nights when he is shirtless Tao sleeps in Kris’s bed. It’s hard not to stare when it’s lying right next to him. It’s hard not to want to touch…
NO.
Just no.
Kris is not gay. He doesn’t care about other people’s sexuality, but he refuses to be gay, refuses to think that he can like another man in that way. His family would certainly freak the shit out if he were gay. Well, part of his family would. His mother and his father would still adore him, but no one else. He’d be shunned. God forbid the company found out. Every minute of his life he finds himself surrounded by men. What if they thought he was going to try to get with them all? Ugh, but Kris doesn’t want them all. He only wants Tao.
So maybe it’s ok if he feels this way. It’s not like he feels this way when he looks at anyone else. It’s just with Tao, with perfect, angelically sculpted, innocent Tao. All the thoughts start to make him feel dirty and gross. The next night, when Tao comes crawling into bed, Kris tries to give him the typical cold shoulder act, but it’s so fucking hard. He caves. Turns his body and hugs Tao and lets him cry until his eyes are puffy and red and can’t seem to squeeze any more tears out.
After a month or two, Tao’s nightly visits become less frequent. Kris can’t decide if this comes as a relief or if it only causes him more distress. He misses the feeling of Tao sleeping next to him. But it’s ok really, because when Tao isn’t in his bed he can think more clearly about how he feels. Everything has gone past the point of him being able to not care about Tao, but he still isn’t quite sure just how much he likes the young man. How far does he really want their relationship go? Is it just a strong liking? Are talking and hugging and being a friend going to be enough or is he going to want more? Kris spends all of his nights without Tao in his bed thinking about these things. Although he’d very much like it to stop at an intense friendship he isn’t sure that such a thing is possible.
Kris knows he’s lost his battle to squander his love when he first hears Tao whisper his name in his sleep. Tao’s whisper spirals around Kris’s mind and heart causing butterflies in his stomach. It’s only his name that Tao whines but Kris feels that there’s more behind it than a simple utterance of his name. He knows it because it’s not “Kris” or even “Kevin” that leaves Tao’s perfect lips, but “Wu Fan”, and Tao only calls him that when he’s being affectionate. Hearing Tao say his name is enough to make Kris realize that just being Tao’s friend isn’t going to be enough. He’s going to want more pretty soon and he can’t think of a way from stopping the want.
It is all too much for Kris to handle at this moment. It is all so cute. So romantic. He wants to lean forward, press his lips to Tao’s perfect lips and hope that maybe Tao will wake and want to kiss him back, but that is too risky. Tao never once seemed to be interested in a romantic relationship with anyone, male or female. He doubts that if Tao wakes up to find Kris’s lips pressed against his he’d accept him, accept his kiss. Instead, Kris bites down his urges and settles for a kiss on Tao’s forehead. That is safe, right? Just a forehead. Nothing romantic or sexual about it, but still affectionate.
Inching closer, Kris gently presses his lips against the younger boy’s forehead. Tao’s skin feels soft and warm against his slightly chapped lips. Something about Tao always seemed so warm to him. But then again didn’t someone else’s touch always feel somewhat warm? Kris tries to convince himself that this is the case. He’s had his fair share of girlfriends before. Kissing them had felt warm too but not to this extent. There is something new in this warmth he feels.
The slight pressure of his lips against Tao’s forehead feels like a delicious different kind of warm than he expected. It feels like chocolate chip cookies freshly pulled out from the oven. Tempting and soft with molten gooey chocolate chips. A delicious burn. He would often eat them hot out of the oven back in Vancouver. Even if the chocolate and cookie dough scorched his tongue, you could be sure that Kris would be the first to latch onto one of those lusciously fresh baked cookies and consume it. He feels the same way about Tao. He wants to consume him even if Tao would eventually burn him. Or did he? Could he really risk losing Tao over this?
Still, Kris can’t abate his obvious desire to kiss Tao squarely on his lips. The thought of it makes him hungry for Tao. He wants to taste him, to kiss his eyelids and nose, and lick and press sweet kisses into his neck, shoulders, back, and chest. To touch his lips against Tao’s and taste him with his tongue and playfully bite his lower lip. To curl his hands in Tao’s hair and pull him so close that his chocolate chip cookie heat can smother him and burn him and fill him with his delicious scent. He wants it so bad that he aches for it and it worries him. Somehow he is losing himself to this kid and he doesn’t like it at all. He is afraid to take the cookie from the jar. He is terrified he’ll drop it and it’ll break and he’ll never get it back. So Kris holds his tongue and when Tao stops curling up in bed with him at night Kris lets it go, but he always keeps an eye on his beloved Tao.
Arbitrarily, one night, when Tao has drunk a little too much with Baekhyun to celebrate the news that they will both officially debut, he curls up in Kris’s bed after several months of not so much as entering Kris’s room. Kris doesn’t try to confess his feelings then even though he wants to. Perhaps a slightly drunk Tao would be more eager to reciprocate, more understanding of Kris’s sweltering emotions. Instead, he settles for kissing Tao’s forehead as he used to when Tao had slept in his bed. Regret replaces the delectable feeling of Tao’s chocolate chip cookie warmth though. This time, when his want for Tao is even higher after so many months of not sharing a bed, Kris almost bursts into tears and he was not one to often cry.
In his sleep Tao never whispers any form of his name. A lovely little “Kris” or “Kevin” would have sufficed at this point in time. One tiny mumble, even if almost inaudible, would have made his stomach flip with fire. Instead the only faint whisper he hears is “My Baekhyun-ie”. Kris has to admit he becomes jealous of Byun Baekhyun after that night. Becomes jealous of how Baekhyun and Tao seem to be so close. This Baekhyun, one of Kris’s fellow trainees, has inside jokes with Tao and cute little nicknames for him. Without even being fluent in Mandarin Baekhyun is able to get close to Tao.
All Kris has with Tao is their shopping adventures in Seoul and a shared language. Lately he hasn’t even had his prized sleepless nights in which Tao would sneak into his bed. He is even jealous of Tao’s goddamn stuffed panda because it gets to sleep with him more often than he does these days. When he can’t glare at Baekhyun in person, Kris would attempts to satisfy himself by glaring at the stuffed animal. When he’s with Baekhyun in person he attempts to be civil. For the most part it works. Baekhyun never seems to suspect Kris’s jealousy, or if he does he never appears to have mentioned it to anyone.
The time continues to pass and Kris forces himself to focus more on work and training than ever before. He too is going to debut soon and in a group with Tao no less. For once, Kris is happy to be able to see shirtless Tao during the day since he no longer gets to see him at night. The months start to fly by quickly. Recording songs, filming teasers, practicing dances for music videos and stage performances. His original excitement and desire for becoming an idol is building once again and helps him forget or at least set aside his feelings for Tao.
Kris even learns to accept Baekhyun more than before now that they are sort of debuting in the same group. When they debut, everyone is jubilant. First the showcase in Korea and then in China. Kris is even kind of sad when he realizes that his Korean counterparts won’t be joining them for their Chinese promotions, but maybe now he’ll get closer to Tao again. With Baekhyun living his life in a different country, maybe Tao will return to Kris. To help Tao move back to his side he likes to look out for him and protect him, always giving helpful comments and telling him how he’s doing a good job. Kris hopes the other members don’t take note of how much he dotes on the young man. The only person who seems to be slightly suspicious of things is Minseok, but he knows Minseok wouldn’t dare say a word. He’s told Kris about his Luhan issue before and Kris has sworn that conversation into secrecy much to Minseok’s relief.
After a particularly stressful day full of interviews and what not, Kris and his fellow members have somehow made Tao their scapegoat for teasing. During their interview, each member had been asked what his ideal type was. Tao’s answer had been a complete fail. Apparently he was too young to know what he liked. His lack of an answer made Kris stifle a snort on set. Honestly, his gorgeous little Tao didn’t know what he liked? Kris thought he could answer for him. Wouldn’t it look something like him?
All of this had clearly been rather stressful for Tao. On the way back to the dorm he had spent the entire care ride hanging his head in shame and fiddling with his fingers nervously. Once inside their apartment, Tao had even started glasses of water. Kris figured Tao had given himself a stomachache. He’d seen Tao chug glasses of water before when he didn’t feel good.
“Careful there. You’ll drink so much water that you’ll end up spending your night having to pee every ten minutes. Can’t afford to lose sleep over this. We’ve got a busy schedule tomorrow.” Kris pats Tao’s shoulder affectionately and wanders down the hall to get ready for bed. At night, though, Kris can’t seem to make himself fall asleep. All he can think about is Tao. Does he truly not know what he wants in a lover? For what feels like hours, Kris tosses around his bed, wrapping and unwrapping himself with his covers. Rolling to one side of his bed and then the other, he feels the ache of the empty space. He wants Tao to be beside him.
To distract himself from these thoughts, he decides to get up and get himself a glass of water. What else can he do aside from roll around unhappily in his bed? He needs to stand up and walk off his feelings, but when he enters the hallways he’s greeted by the sight of Tao stubbing his toe on the doorpost of the bathroom. His eyes travel up the length of Tao’s body and he realizes that Tao is squishing that goddamn panda against his face and chest. Kris would give almost anything at this moment to be that stupid panda.
“Everything ok?” Kris calls into the darkness, startling Tao and causing him to drop his panda. It hits the ground with a destitute thud. Yes, Kris definitely feels like that panda right now. Tao had once hugged him dearly like that stupid thing, and like that thing he had also been dropped.
“Everything’s fine,” Tao whispers hoarsely and walks into the bathroom, leaving his panda on the floor. Kris glares at the panda as he walks by it towards the kitchen to get his glass of water. As he stands there and slowly drinks water from a glass, Kris stares sympathetically at the panda. Is Tao dumping him too? He brought it all the way out into the hall with him but forgot him there instead of taking him into the bathroom. He almost feels sorry for the stuffed panda. If he were the panda he’d have wanted to join Tao in the bathroom, not be left out in the dark hall. If he were Tao’s panda, he probably wouldn’t care about whether or not he was in the bathroom with Tao watching him pee.
In a gross way, Kris almost wishes he were in that bathroom with Tao. Perhaps while he was busy doing his business he’d sneak up behind Tao, wrap his arms around his back, and press a kiss into his neck. Would Tao jump in surprise at Kris’s touch or would he sink into the feeling too much until his exposed self started to turn hard the way Kris was starting to. Kris chokes on his water due to too many dirty thoughts. He dumps the remainder of the water into the sink and slams the glass down on the counter. These are futile. Tao hasn’t really gone back to him, not yet. Tao still only thought of his Baekhyun-ie. Frustrated at almost letting his desire for Tao return, Kris shuffles into the hallway and kicks the stupid panda.
“I shouldn’t want to be you, damn it!” Kris grumbles. For a minute he stands there and glares at the panda that he so rudely kicked. Since Baekhyun isn’t in his line of sight to be envious of, Kris once again has to settle for glaring at the panda. Hearing the flush of the toilet, Kris snaps out of his dazed stare down with the panda and picks him up. Carefully, he dusts him off and restores the fluffiness of his fir so that there are no signs of damage from being kicked. Tao is more than a little shocked to see Kris standing outside the bathroom door waiting for him with his panda.
“You dropped this,” Kris pretends to yawn.
“Thanks.” Tao tentatively grabs the panda from his hands.
“Mmm,” is all Kris can manage to mumble. He’s still pissed off at the panda for being closer to Tao than he is. To Kris’s surprise, Tao follows behind him down the hallway and into his bedroom. Is this a sign that Tao is coming back to him? No. Kris can’t afford to think like that. Not with that damn thing joining them as well. It’s like Tao is taking Baekhyun into bed with them as well.
When Tao slides into his bed that night, he doesn’t think twice about turning his back on him. He doesn’t want to be so close, to see the forehead he once always hungered to kiss, still always hungers to kiss. He can’t stand the chocolate chip cookie heat spreading throughout his body and the way it affects his body, sending his blood rushing to his groin. He doesn’t need those kinds of feelings. Not now, not ever, not for Tao. He wants to run back to all of his old girlfriends and kiss them and have sex with them until he’s “cured” himself of his love and desire for Tao, but he knows it doesn’t work that way.
Maybe he’s bi instead of straight nowadays, but does it really matter? It’s not the fact that he likes a man that even bothers him now. It’s the fact that he likes a man that doesn’t seem to like him back. Bottom line is, he knows that jumping into bed with random people or even an old ex won’t cure him of this. The only thing that can fix this issue is Tao himself, but he doesn’t think Tao will ever care about him that way, especially not now that he has his Baekhyun-ie.
“Baekhyun-ie can be sexy too.” Kris hears Tao mutter into the darkness of his bedroom after trying to ask him what he should say about his ideal type. Ah, so that’s why little Tao had followed gege into bed. He doesn’t know how to answer that question from earlier in the day. Even after going to bed he’d continued to stress about it. Kris thought it was cute that Tao was struggling so much to define what he liked, but now Kris wanted to take all of those thoughts and shove them down the garbage disposal.
“What?” Kris mumbles groggily with disappointment. He’s slightly shocked by Tao’s whisper. In Kris’s very bed Tao has the boldness to call this “Baekhyun-ie” sexy. Minutes ago Tao had been asking about what to do if he couldn’t define his ideal type and now he was talking about his “Baekhyun-ie”. Kris can’t stop himself from frowning. Was Tao asking him what he should say about his ideal type because he was afraid to admit that his ideal type was someone like Baekhyun, if not Baekhyun himself? Kris bit his lip to stop himself from crying out in frustration.
“Nothing,” Tao mumbles, “good night.”
Kris can feel Tao has he turned so that his back was pressing his back along his. It feels so warm that it sucks the heat out of Kris. So close. Too close. The feeling of Tao’s body perfectly aligned with his feels comforting and disturbing. Despite the gurgling frustration about Baekhyun, the pressure of Tao’s back against his only made his want grow. He wants to turn around, bury his head in the crook of Tao’s neck and kiss it the way he had wanted to do when he imagined himself in the bathroom with Tao.
Kris can imagine his arms wrapping around Tao’s waist as he does it. With slow and smooth motions he’d let his hands slip underneath Tao’s tight fitting pajama shirt. Leisurely he’d let his fingers paint across Tao’s defined abs. He wants to feel Tao curl against him and shiver with pleasure, to hear him moan with the same want that Kris felt with every inch of his body. Or maybe, just maybe, he’d let his hand drift down to the waistband of Tao’s pants and toy with it before letting his fingers slide forward and slip underneath the fabric to feel…
No.
He has to stop this fantasy.
Tao doesn’t like him. He likes his “Baekhyun-ie”.
The only way he knew how to stop it was to tell Tao that his feet feel freezing and to move because he’s too close. God only knows that Kris can’t force himself to move away, especially when he feels like this. Just staying in his current position is enough of a struggle. But Tao doesn’t move away. Instead he snuggles in even closer, if such a thing is possible. Kris is almost throbbing with want now, so much so that it has developed into a need. What feels like ten dreadfully long minutes pass and Kris can’t will himself to calm down and not react to Tao’s touch.
“Damn you,” Kris curses, flips off the covers to dissipate the growing heat in his body and turns to face Tao’s back. If he can’t handle not facing him, he doesn’t think it will make a difference whether he stares at Tao’s gorgeous body or not, with these current emotions and desires. If he’s going to have to share a bed with Tao tonight he might as well be able to look at his lover.
His eyes roam over Tao’s backside from the tip of his head down to where his toes are slightly covered by the blanket Kris had tossed to the edge of the bed. Kris just wants to touch everything. Touch Tao’s hips, run his hands across his back and down his thighs. Slide his hands down Tao’s leanly muscled arms and entwine his fingers in between Tao’s. But he doesn’t want to just touch him through his clothes; he wants to feel Tao’s bare, flawless skin against his. He wants to do so much touching and more that he almost thinks he’s going to have to touch himself because he’s imagining this all too vividly and it’s definitely getting to him, if you know what he means.
“Fuck. Just fuck. The fuck am I supposed to do?” he groans. Chen, his roommate, and Tao, can be pretty heavy sleepers, which is wonderful when Kris can’t help but cuss out all of his frustration in the middle of the night. Swearing is not something he typically does, but when he feels like he has no control over himself curse words start to tumble out of his mouth. Luckily, he also tends to swear in English. His band mates don’t know every swearword in the English dictionary or language so he can get away with saying most things.
But even the swearing can’t stop this feeling that he has. Now it’s gone from being simply in his mind to physically displaying itself. Kris is almost embarrassed by his own body’s actions. He even starts imagining Tao calling his name like he used to back when Tao used to cry himself to sleep. So, great, now he’s absolutely lost it. Gone “fucking insane” as he would like to say. He can’t handle it anymore and desperately needs to find release somehow. Well he knows how…
Sheepishly, Kris starts to sneak out of bed towards the bathroom. It’s the only place he can be certain he won’t have to risk being seen in this state. A bathroom door can be locked. Alone, in the bathroom, without the presence of the Tao he so desires, is where he can lock himself in and finish his shameful business.
As Kris slowly moves towards the end of the bed Tao turns in his sleep to face where Kris had been lying down. For a second Kris is frightened that Tao has woken up. He doesn’t want to be seen with this obvious issue in his pants in front of a sleepy, half-awake Tao. But then, when Kris is almost out of the bed, he hears the unthinkable.
“Wu Fan.” Kris stares at Tao’s lips in disbelief. He freezes in place and watches intently as Tao’s mouth forms his name again with a breezy sigh. “So perfect.” Kris shudders at the words, feeling tiny shocks spread down his back. The third time Tao says his name is when Kris deftly slides back into bed facing Tao with an intense stare. Tao whispers his name continuously for a few minutes and Kris watches him and shivers with happiness. He almost can’t tell if he’s shivering because he’s actually getting cold now or if it’s just the excitement from hearing his beloved say his name in his sleep. Kris reaches for the covers and pulls them up around him creating a private little bed sheet tent for the two of them.
By now he’s so distracted by the thought that maybe before he wasn’t imagining hearing Tao call his name that he forgets about the very prominent problem in his pants. He could almost drown in his delight listening to Tao say his name. The sound of it is soothing and shiny like polished marble stones that he used to like to run his fingers through when he was a kid. Tao’s whispers of his name and the building heat underneath the covers start to lull Kris into sleep. Because of Tao, he feels as though he is listening to his own personal lullaby.
“Wu Fan,” Tao moans his name contentedly. It’s enough to rouse Kris from his almost slumber. Are his ears deceiving him? A moan. Tao fucking moaned and it’s because of him. “So warm, my precious Wu Fan,” Tao moans again. Yes, Kris thinks, warm and sweet and delicious. And, oh my God, he called him precious. Kris wants to squirm with glee. People don’t usually call him precious.
“So lovely,” Tao sighs and lets his mouth fall open into a loose grin. His sigh sounds so content, so angelic and gorgeous and beautiful that Kris can’t control himself any longer. He lets himself do what he’s always restrained from doing before. He wraps his arm around Tao’s waist and inches closer until he’s so close to Tao’s face that he feels like he’s standing with his face pressed against a big, flat screen T.V. The proximity of their faces is so close that he can’t see anything but Tao’s eyes, nose, and his beautiful, slightly open mouth. Everything is in high definition. The way he smells, the hardly noticeable blemishes on his face, the feeling of Tao’s soft breathe against his cheeks.
After all the nights of stifling desire, Kris lets himself kiss Tao’s lips softly and graze his lips across Tao’s cheek. He must be careful not to wake him if he wants to continue. Finally Kris gets to kiss Tao’s pretty little eyelids and nose and cheeks a million times, and in between each of those kisses he always returns back to Tao’s mouth. Sometimes he just kisses Tao tenderly, other times gently nibbles that succulent lower lip, and occasionally gets daring enough to lick it. To Kris, this is as close to eating the chocolate chip cookie that he can afford to get right now. The taste of Tao in his mouth is better than any cookie Kris will ever eat and it makes him want more, but he doesn’t dare move his hands along Tao’s body for fear that he will wake him.
In the darkness and security of his own bed, he continues to kiss every centimeter of Tao’s perfect face. Every now and then he swallow Tao’s contented sighs and moans. Every whisper of his name and dreamy comment about how gorgeous and wonderful and amazing Kris apparently is, fill Kris up and make him feel heady and heavy. Until Kris can hardly keeps his eyes open any longer he eats up all of Tao’s words, swallowing, kissing, and licking until he feels so full that he almost can’t do it anymore. With an arm securely wrapped around Tao’s waist and his face so close to Tao’s that they are almost touching, Kris finally succumbs to his own lovely dreamland filled with Tao.
Even in the morning when he wakes up to find that Tao has slipped out of his bed, he still feels content and certain of his place in Tao’s heart. A gleam of determination sets place in his eyes. Maybe not today, but soon he’s going to tell Tao how he feels. When the two of them are alone together, maybe the next time Tao slips into his bed, he’s going to say it. He’s going to admit just how much he’s in love with Tao and kiss him and hold him and touch him until Tao admits it too. After last night, he knows that Tao must like him. So many happy sigh, whispers and compliments. And the moaning.
Kris remembers every single one of the noises that escaped from Tao’s lips right down to the moans and he vows never to forget them. In fact, maybe he’ll even use them to his advantage to tease Tao before he admits to liking him. Secretly, he wants Tao to suffer as he has. Something about making Tao lust after him feels justifying and delicious in almost the same way that Kris likes those chocolate chip cookies. Now he just has to think of a way to make his lover sweat enough to come to the realization that he’s in love with him.
But how?
To his surprise he finds that Tao has left his stuffed panda in Kris’s bed. Kris looks at the panda with curiosity for once instead of jealousy. This thing, this panda that Tao for some reason loves so dearly, could be his first step in forcing Tao to come to terms with his feelings. Tao’s “Baekhyun-ie” gave this to him, didn’t he? Or he at least named it, Kris is sure of that. Baekhyun won’t stand a chance against Kris’s newfound determination. In a matter of minutes, Kris has gone from lovey-dovey lustful Kris to naughty Kris and begins to formulate a plan.
“I think it’s time that my Tao forgot all about his Baekhyun-ie,” Kris grins manically.
***
“Xiumin, can you give this back to Tao for me?” Kris hands the stuffed panda over to Minseok after breakfast. He’d taken to calling Minseok by his stage name recently for good measure. They were all supposed to practice getting used to their stage names until it felt like their own original birth name. “And make sure to give him my regards,” Kris snickers. Yes, this is going to go perfectly.
“Ah, this explains a lot,” Minseok nods his head in agreement with some secret suspicion he’s keeping from Kris.
“What do you mean?” Kris questions tentatively but with an uninterested tone.
“After Tao came back into our room this morning he must have come from your room. He wouldn’t shut up about you in his sleep. Something about a male god and wanting a kiss. Well a bit more than a kiss, I think.” Minseok furrows his brow. “Ah, I shouldn’t be tell-”Minseok stops short when he sees the contented grin on Kris’s face.
“I assume you’ve already heard most of it…” Minseok trails off suggestively. Kris nods and lets his grin turn wicked. “Anything in particular you want me to do about it?” he asks, sensing that Kris is all too happy about Tao’s sleep talking and is in a mood to play. Ever since Tao had first snuck into Kris’s bed and wept himself to sleep in Kris’s arms, Minseok could tell that something would eventually happen between them. For some reason, he just never thought that Kris would be the first one to crack and develop feelings. Minseok, while suffering from his own unrequited love, had been watching the two of them closely for months.
“Make him sweat, Minseok-ah,” Kris hums. “He deserves a little suffering after what I’ve been through.”
“Ne,” Minseok smiles in agreement and slightly bows before leaving to get ready for the day. At least this way he can have a bit of fun too instead of constantly wallowing over Luhan. It will be a nice distraction from his broken heart. Unlike Kris, he hadn’t waited to find out if his feelings had been returned. He’d confessed without thinking and regretted it immediately.
The only reason why Luhan acts so cute around him is due to their company’s determination that the fans would love it. Minseok would love it too if he knew that Luhan wasn’t forcing himself to fake it all. With a wicked grin he decides that he’ll help Kris out, but he’ll torture Tao at the same time to satisfy his dejected heart. It’s cruel, yes, but it isn’t like he is going to turn Tao away from Kris. Besides, Kris wants this too and Minseok would certainly assist his leader.
In the evening, after another successful interview in which Tao basically uses Kris’s exact words to describe his ideal type, Kris is able to listen in on the beginning of Tao’s torture. Minseok winks at Kris and waves the panda at him before walking into his shared room with Tao. The other members have already gone to bed so Kris feels no shame in sneaking up to their bedroom door and eavesdropping. Carefully, Kris presses himself against the door until he is certain he cannot get any closer.
Kris can hear it all and almost picture it all. The rough way Minseok hands Tao back his panda courtesy of him. The way he complains about Tao’s nighttime mumbling without really telling him what exactly he said in his sleep. When Tao starts spouting random nonsense in Mandarin and Korean about how never did such a thing, Kris imagines Tao’s face turning a lovely shade of pink. If he kissed him, would his face turn pink, or would it turn bright red and burn his fingers as he stroked Tao’s cheek? Kris is almost hoping it will be the latter. Just like with his chocolate chip cookies, Kris likes to feel the radiating heat.
His favorite part is when Minseok bluntly tells Tao not to sneak out of their room and into Kris’s bed anymore. Now his face must really be red. The sound of Minseok patting Tao on the shoulder and the rustling of cloth warns Kris that Minseok is headed towards the door. Quickly, Kris tiptoes away from the door and sits on the couch. When he sees Minseok walk through the door and give Kris a thumbs-up and walk to the bathroom, Kris snorts with amusement. Kris has to smother his growling giggle with a couch cushion to stop it from spreading throughout the dorm.
“Soon, Tao, I’ll make you realize just how much you want me. I’ll kiss you the way I kissed you in your sleep and you’ll whisper my name into the kiss the way you did in your dreams. One day Tao, you’ll feel just how hungry for me you are,” Kris whispers and smirks into the cushion.
One day, he’ll have his Tao all to himself.
Pairing: Tao/Kris
Rating: PG-13
Summary: [Companion to Difficult Thoughts] Kris struggles with his feelings for Tao that are all too prominent while sharing a bed.
Sharing a Bed
After being a trainee for years and being from a different country, Kris is definitely learned in the art of homesickness. Well, most of the time he is. When the ache for his family and friends back home starts to weigh on him he finds ways to distract himself. Dance harder. Practice singing and rapping more diligently. Eat comforting but healthy foods. To move forward he must not dwell on what his life used to be but where it is right now and how he wants it to go in the future.
Kris wants to be an idol star just as much as he misses his family. It would be nice if he could have both at the same time, but his family can’t exactly afford to drop everything and move to South Korea, nor would he really have the free time to visit them if they did. His schedule is strict and must be followed to a T if he wants to debut someday. It’s not like he’s lost his family anyways. They still keep in touch, just not as often as Kris would always like.
When Kris sees the new Chinese trainee waltz into the room he doesn’t peg him for a crier. He seems strong and disciplined. Perhaps even a tad dark. This kid definitely has good potential. After all the years of seeing trainees come and go from SM Entertainment, he is getting good at picking out the ones who’ll chicken out and the ones who will stick with it. Seeing as how Tao is going to be rooming with Yixing, Luhan, and himself, he decides to walk over to the new boy and get acquainted.
“Huang Zi Tao,” the younger boy introduces himself gently. The voice does not match the body, Kris decides.
“Wu Fan, I mean Kevin,” Kris introduces himself, a bit flustered.
“Kevin?” Tao hums. “Why not Wu Fan?” his gaze is curious, young, and unadulterated by life.
“Just… reasons,” Kris shrugs. He doesn’t yet realize that a few nights later, when Tao is sobbing in his arms, that he’ll be telling Tao exactly why he doesn’t want to be “Wu Fan” when he’s in Korea. It makes him miss his home way too much. When he is Wu Fan, he misses his family in Canada and in China. When he is just “Kevin”, he wills himself to only miss his direct family in Canada. It’s the small subtle barriers that he puts up to cope with his current life that always seem to help Tao cope with his. Telling Tao these little secrets about himself is the only way he can make Tao calm down and sleep instead of crying every night from homesickness.
At first, Kris doesn’t think much about how Tao always sneaks into his bed in the middle of the night when he can’t stop crying. By the fifth time Tao crawls into his bed with tears in his eyes Kris begins to wonder exactly why this kid always has to come to his bed. Tao is either a complete mush ball or maybe he likes him and uses homesickness as an excuse? No, Tao doesn’t like him. He can’t like him. He’s a man. Both of them are men. Kris only likes girls. He likes women with nice breasts that he can toy with and a vagina. Not a man with flat chest and a penis. But he does have nice abs, Kris thinks after several weeks of seeing the younger man shirtless.
Wait.
Nope.
He doesn’t want that… does he?
I mean, a man’s abs are clearly nothing like a woman’s breasts…but his body tells him otherwise when Tao sinks into his peaceful slumber every night after crying. Or at least his body starts to react the way it would to seeing a topless woman. After this realization, Kris tries to avoid seeing shirtless Tao as much as he possibly can, but it doesn’t always work. Sometimes Tao sleeps shirtless, and sometimes those nights when he is shirtless Tao sleeps in Kris’s bed. It’s hard not to stare when it’s lying right next to him. It’s hard not to want to touch…
NO.
Just no.
Kris is not gay. He doesn’t care about other people’s sexuality, but he refuses to be gay, refuses to think that he can like another man in that way. His family would certainly freak the shit out if he were gay. Well, part of his family would. His mother and his father would still adore him, but no one else. He’d be shunned. God forbid the company found out. Every minute of his life he finds himself surrounded by men. What if they thought he was going to try to get with them all? Ugh, but Kris doesn’t want them all. He only wants Tao.
So maybe it’s ok if he feels this way. It’s not like he feels this way when he looks at anyone else. It’s just with Tao, with perfect, angelically sculpted, innocent Tao. All the thoughts start to make him feel dirty and gross. The next night, when Tao comes crawling into bed, Kris tries to give him the typical cold shoulder act, but it’s so fucking hard. He caves. Turns his body and hugs Tao and lets him cry until his eyes are puffy and red and can’t seem to squeeze any more tears out.
After a month or two, Tao’s nightly visits become less frequent. Kris can’t decide if this comes as a relief or if it only causes him more distress. He misses the feeling of Tao sleeping next to him. But it’s ok really, because when Tao isn’t in his bed he can think more clearly about how he feels. Everything has gone past the point of him being able to not care about Tao, but he still isn’t quite sure just how much he likes the young man. How far does he really want their relationship go? Is it just a strong liking? Are talking and hugging and being a friend going to be enough or is he going to want more? Kris spends all of his nights without Tao in his bed thinking about these things. Although he’d very much like it to stop at an intense friendship he isn’t sure that such a thing is possible.
Kris knows he’s lost his battle to squander his love when he first hears Tao whisper his name in his sleep. Tao’s whisper spirals around Kris’s mind and heart causing butterflies in his stomach. It’s only his name that Tao whines but Kris feels that there’s more behind it than a simple utterance of his name. He knows it because it’s not “Kris” or even “Kevin” that leaves Tao’s perfect lips, but “Wu Fan”, and Tao only calls him that when he’s being affectionate. Hearing Tao say his name is enough to make Kris realize that just being Tao’s friend isn’t going to be enough. He’s going to want more pretty soon and he can’t think of a way from stopping the want.
It is all too much for Kris to handle at this moment. It is all so cute. So romantic. He wants to lean forward, press his lips to Tao’s perfect lips and hope that maybe Tao will wake and want to kiss him back, but that is too risky. Tao never once seemed to be interested in a romantic relationship with anyone, male or female. He doubts that if Tao wakes up to find Kris’s lips pressed against his he’d accept him, accept his kiss. Instead, Kris bites down his urges and settles for a kiss on Tao’s forehead. That is safe, right? Just a forehead. Nothing romantic or sexual about it, but still affectionate.
Inching closer, Kris gently presses his lips against the younger boy’s forehead. Tao’s skin feels soft and warm against his slightly chapped lips. Something about Tao always seemed so warm to him. But then again didn’t someone else’s touch always feel somewhat warm? Kris tries to convince himself that this is the case. He’s had his fair share of girlfriends before. Kissing them had felt warm too but not to this extent. There is something new in this warmth he feels.
The slight pressure of his lips against Tao’s forehead feels like a delicious different kind of warm than he expected. It feels like chocolate chip cookies freshly pulled out from the oven. Tempting and soft with molten gooey chocolate chips. A delicious burn. He would often eat them hot out of the oven back in Vancouver. Even if the chocolate and cookie dough scorched his tongue, you could be sure that Kris would be the first to latch onto one of those lusciously fresh baked cookies and consume it. He feels the same way about Tao. He wants to consume him even if Tao would eventually burn him. Or did he? Could he really risk losing Tao over this?
Still, Kris can’t abate his obvious desire to kiss Tao squarely on his lips. The thought of it makes him hungry for Tao. He wants to taste him, to kiss his eyelids and nose, and lick and press sweet kisses into his neck, shoulders, back, and chest. To touch his lips against Tao’s and taste him with his tongue and playfully bite his lower lip. To curl his hands in Tao’s hair and pull him so close that his chocolate chip cookie heat can smother him and burn him and fill him with his delicious scent. He wants it so bad that he aches for it and it worries him. Somehow he is losing himself to this kid and he doesn’t like it at all. He is afraid to take the cookie from the jar. He is terrified he’ll drop it and it’ll break and he’ll never get it back. So Kris holds his tongue and when Tao stops curling up in bed with him at night Kris lets it go, but he always keeps an eye on his beloved Tao.
Arbitrarily, one night, when Tao has drunk a little too much with Baekhyun to celebrate the news that they will both officially debut, he curls up in Kris’s bed after several months of not so much as entering Kris’s room. Kris doesn’t try to confess his feelings then even though he wants to. Perhaps a slightly drunk Tao would be more eager to reciprocate, more understanding of Kris’s sweltering emotions. Instead, he settles for kissing Tao’s forehead as he used to when Tao had slept in his bed. Regret replaces the delectable feeling of Tao’s chocolate chip cookie warmth though. This time, when his want for Tao is even higher after so many months of not sharing a bed, Kris almost bursts into tears and he was not one to often cry.
In his sleep Tao never whispers any form of his name. A lovely little “Kris” or “Kevin” would have sufficed at this point in time. One tiny mumble, even if almost inaudible, would have made his stomach flip with fire. Instead the only faint whisper he hears is “My Baekhyun-ie”. Kris has to admit he becomes jealous of Byun Baekhyun after that night. Becomes jealous of how Baekhyun and Tao seem to be so close. This Baekhyun, one of Kris’s fellow trainees, has inside jokes with Tao and cute little nicknames for him. Without even being fluent in Mandarin Baekhyun is able to get close to Tao.
All Kris has with Tao is their shopping adventures in Seoul and a shared language. Lately he hasn’t even had his prized sleepless nights in which Tao would sneak into his bed. He is even jealous of Tao’s goddamn stuffed panda because it gets to sleep with him more often than he does these days. When he can’t glare at Baekhyun in person, Kris would attempts to satisfy himself by glaring at the stuffed animal. When he’s with Baekhyun in person he attempts to be civil. For the most part it works. Baekhyun never seems to suspect Kris’s jealousy, or if he does he never appears to have mentioned it to anyone.
The time continues to pass and Kris forces himself to focus more on work and training than ever before. He too is going to debut soon and in a group with Tao no less. For once, Kris is happy to be able to see shirtless Tao during the day since he no longer gets to see him at night. The months start to fly by quickly. Recording songs, filming teasers, practicing dances for music videos and stage performances. His original excitement and desire for becoming an idol is building once again and helps him forget or at least set aside his feelings for Tao.
Kris even learns to accept Baekhyun more than before now that they are sort of debuting in the same group. When they debut, everyone is jubilant. First the showcase in Korea and then in China. Kris is even kind of sad when he realizes that his Korean counterparts won’t be joining them for their Chinese promotions, but maybe now he’ll get closer to Tao again. With Baekhyun living his life in a different country, maybe Tao will return to Kris. To help Tao move back to his side he likes to look out for him and protect him, always giving helpful comments and telling him how he’s doing a good job. Kris hopes the other members don’t take note of how much he dotes on the young man. The only person who seems to be slightly suspicious of things is Minseok, but he knows Minseok wouldn’t dare say a word. He’s told Kris about his Luhan issue before and Kris has sworn that conversation into secrecy much to Minseok’s relief.
After a particularly stressful day full of interviews and what not, Kris and his fellow members have somehow made Tao their scapegoat for teasing. During their interview, each member had been asked what his ideal type was. Tao’s answer had been a complete fail. Apparently he was too young to know what he liked. His lack of an answer made Kris stifle a snort on set. Honestly, his gorgeous little Tao didn’t know what he liked? Kris thought he could answer for him. Wouldn’t it look something like him?
All of this had clearly been rather stressful for Tao. On the way back to the dorm he had spent the entire care ride hanging his head in shame and fiddling with his fingers nervously. Once inside their apartment, Tao had even started glasses of water. Kris figured Tao had given himself a stomachache. He’d seen Tao chug glasses of water before when he didn’t feel good.
“Careful there. You’ll drink so much water that you’ll end up spending your night having to pee every ten minutes. Can’t afford to lose sleep over this. We’ve got a busy schedule tomorrow.” Kris pats Tao’s shoulder affectionately and wanders down the hall to get ready for bed. At night, though, Kris can’t seem to make himself fall asleep. All he can think about is Tao. Does he truly not know what he wants in a lover? For what feels like hours, Kris tosses around his bed, wrapping and unwrapping himself with his covers. Rolling to one side of his bed and then the other, he feels the ache of the empty space. He wants Tao to be beside him.
To distract himself from these thoughts, he decides to get up and get himself a glass of water. What else can he do aside from roll around unhappily in his bed? He needs to stand up and walk off his feelings, but when he enters the hallways he’s greeted by the sight of Tao stubbing his toe on the doorpost of the bathroom. His eyes travel up the length of Tao’s body and he realizes that Tao is squishing that goddamn panda against his face and chest. Kris would give almost anything at this moment to be that stupid panda.
“Everything ok?” Kris calls into the darkness, startling Tao and causing him to drop his panda. It hits the ground with a destitute thud. Yes, Kris definitely feels like that panda right now. Tao had once hugged him dearly like that stupid thing, and like that thing he had also been dropped.
“Everything’s fine,” Tao whispers hoarsely and walks into the bathroom, leaving his panda on the floor. Kris glares at the panda as he walks by it towards the kitchen to get his glass of water. As he stands there and slowly drinks water from a glass, Kris stares sympathetically at the panda. Is Tao dumping him too? He brought it all the way out into the hall with him but forgot him there instead of taking him into the bathroom. He almost feels sorry for the stuffed panda. If he were the panda he’d have wanted to join Tao in the bathroom, not be left out in the dark hall. If he were Tao’s panda, he probably wouldn’t care about whether or not he was in the bathroom with Tao watching him pee.
In a gross way, Kris almost wishes he were in that bathroom with Tao. Perhaps while he was busy doing his business he’d sneak up behind Tao, wrap his arms around his back, and press a kiss into his neck. Would Tao jump in surprise at Kris’s touch or would he sink into the feeling too much until his exposed self started to turn hard the way Kris was starting to. Kris chokes on his water due to too many dirty thoughts. He dumps the remainder of the water into the sink and slams the glass down on the counter. These are futile. Tao hasn’t really gone back to him, not yet. Tao still only thought of his Baekhyun-ie. Frustrated at almost letting his desire for Tao return, Kris shuffles into the hallway and kicks the stupid panda.
“I shouldn’t want to be you, damn it!” Kris grumbles. For a minute he stands there and glares at the panda that he so rudely kicked. Since Baekhyun isn’t in his line of sight to be envious of, Kris once again has to settle for glaring at the panda. Hearing the flush of the toilet, Kris snaps out of his dazed stare down with the panda and picks him up. Carefully, he dusts him off and restores the fluffiness of his fir so that there are no signs of damage from being kicked. Tao is more than a little shocked to see Kris standing outside the bathroom door waiting for him with his panda.
“You dropped this,” Kris pretends to yawn.
“Thanks.” Tao tentatively grabs the panda from his hands.
“Mmm,” is all Kris can manage to mumble. He’s still pissed off at the panda for being closer to Tao than he is. To Kris’s surprise, Tao follows behind him down the hallway and into his bedroom. Is this a sign that Tao is coming back to him? No. Kris can’t afford to think like that. Not with that damn thing joining them as well. It’s like Tao is taking Baekhyun into bed with them as well.
When Tao slides into his bed that night, he doesn’t think twice about turning his back on him. He doesn’t want to be so close, to see the forehead he once always hungered to kiss, still always hungers to kiss. He can’t stand the chocolate chip cookie heat spreading throughout his body and the way it affects his body, sending his blood rushing to his groin. He doesn’t need those kinds of feelings. Not now, not ever, not for Tao. He wants to run back to all of his old girlfriends and kiss them and have sex with them until he’s “cured” himself of his love and desire for Tao, but he knows it doesn’t work that way.
Maybe he’s bi instead of straight nowadays, but does it really matter? It’s not the fact that he likes a man that even bothers him now. It’s the fact that he likes a man that doesn’t seem to like him back. Bottom line is, he knows that jumping into bed with random people or even an old ex won’t cure him of this. The only thing that can fix this issue is Tao himself, but he doesn’t think Tao will ever care about him that way, especially not now that he has his Baekhyun-ie.
“Baekhyun-ie can be sexy too.” Kris hears Tao mutter into the darkness of his bedroom after trying to ask him what he should say about his ideal type. Ah, so that’s why little Tao had followed gege into bed. He doesn’t know how to answer that question from earlier in the day. Even after going to bed he’d continued to stress about it. Kris thought it was cute that Tao was struggling so much to define what he liked, but now Kris wanted to take all of those thoughts and shove them down the garbage disposal.
“What?” Kris mumbles groggily with disappointment. He’s slightly shocked by Tao’s whisper. In Kris’s very bed Tao has the boldness to call this “Baekhyun-ie” sexy. Minutes ago Tao had been asking about what to do if he couldn’t define his ideal type and now he was talking about his “Baekhyun-ie”. Kris can’t stop himself from frowning. Was Tao asking him what he should say about his ideal type because he was afraid to admit that his ideal type was someone like Baekhyun, if not Baekhyun himself? Kris bit his lip to stop himself from crying out in frustration.
“Nothing,” Tao mumbles, “good night.”
Kris can feel Tao has he turned so that his back was pressing his back along his. It feels so warm that it sucks the heat out of Kris. So close. Too close. The feeling of Tao’s body perfectly aligned with his feels comforting and disturbing. Despite the gurgling frustration about Baekhyun, the pressure of Tao’s back against his only made his want grow. He wants to turn around, bury his head in the crook of Tao’s neck and kiss it the way he had wanted to do when he imagined himself in the bathroom with Tao.
Kris can imagine his arms wrapping around Tao’s waist as he does it. With slow and smooth motions he’d let his hands slip underneath Tao’s tight fitting pajama shirt. Leisurely he’d let his fingers paint across Tao’s defined abs. He wants to feel Tao curl against him and shiver with pleasure, to hear him moan with the same want that Kris felt with every inch of his body. Or maybe, just maybe, he’d let his hand drift down to the waistband of Tao’s pants and toy with it before letting his fingers slide forward and slip underneath the fabric to feel…
No.
He has to stop this fantasy.
Tao doesn’t like him. He likes his “Baekhyun-ie”.
The only way he knew how to stop it was to tell Tao that his feet feel freezing and to move because he’s too close. God only knows that Kris can’t force himself to move away, especially when he feels like this. Just staying in his current position is enough of a struggle. But Tao doesn’t move away. Instead he snuggles in even closer, if such a thing is possible. Kris is almost throbbing with want now, so much so that it has developed into a need. What feels like ten dreadfully long minutes pass and Kris can’t will himself to calm down and not react to Tao’s touch.
“Damn you,” Kris curses, flips off the covers to dissipate the growing heat in his body and turns to face Tao’s back. If he can’t handle not facing him, he doesn’t think it will make a difference whether he stares at Tao’s gorgeous body or not, with these current emotions and desires. If he’s going to have to share a bed with Tao tonight he might as well be able to look at his lover.
His eyes roam over Tao’s backside from the tip of his head down to where his toes are slightly covered by the blanket Kris had tossed to the edge of the bed. Kris just wants to touch everything. Touch Tao’s hips, run his hands across his back and down his thighs. Slide his hands down Tao’s leanly muscled arms and entwine his fingers in between Tao’s. But he doesn’t want to just touch him through his clothes; he wants to feel Tao’s bare, flawless skin against his. He wants to do so much touching and more that he almost thinks he’s going to have to touch himself because he’s imagining this all too vividly and it’s definitely getting to him, if you know what he means.
“Fuck. Just fuck. The fuck am I supposed to do?” he groans. Chen, his roommate, and Tao, can be pretty heavy sleepers, which is wonderful when Kris can’t help but cuss out all of his frustration in the middle of the night. Swearing is not something he typically does, but when he feels like he has no control over himself curse words start to tumble out of his mouth. Luckily, he also tends to swear in English. His band mates don’t know every swearword in the English dictionary or language so he can get away with saying most things.
But even the swearing can’t stop this feeling that he has. Now it’s gone from being simply in his mind to physically displaying itself. Kris is almost embarrassed by his own body’s actions. He even starts imagining Tao calling his name like he used to back when Tao used to cry himself to sleep. So, great, now he’s absolutely lost it. Gone “fucking insane” as he would like to say. He can’t handle it anymore and desperately needs to find release somehow. Well he knows how…
Sheepishly, Kris starts to sneak out of bed towards the bathroom. It’s the only place he can be certain he won’t have to risk being seen in this state. A bathroom door can be locked. Alone, in the bathroom, without the presence of the Tao he so desires, is where he can lock himself in and finish his shameful business.
As Kris slowly moves towards the end of the bed Tao turns in his sleep to face where Kris had been lying down. For a second Kris is frightened that Tao has woken up. He doesn’t want to be seen with this obvious issue in his pants in front of a sleepy, half-awake Tao. But then, when Kris is almost out of the bed, he hears the unthinkable.
“Wu Fan.” Kris stares at Tao’s lips in disbelief. He freezes in place and watches intently as Tao’s mouth forms his name again with a breezy sigh. “So perfect.” Kris shudders at the words, feeling tiny shocks spread down his back. The third time Tao says his name is when Kris deftly slides back into bed facing Tao with an intense stare. Tao whispers his name continuously for a few minutes and Kris watches him and shivers with happiness. He almost can’t tell if he’s shivering because he’s actually getting cold now or if it’s just the excitement from hearing his beloved say his name in his sleep. Kris reaches for the covers and pulls them up around him creating a private little bed sheet tent for the two of them.
By now he’s so distracted by the thought that maybe before he wasn’t imagining hearing Tao call his name that he forgets about the very prominent problem in his pants. He could almost drown in his delight listening to Tao say his name. The sound of it is soothing and shiny like polished marble stones that he used to like to run his fingers through when he was a kid. Tao’s whispers of his name and the building heat underneath the covers start to lull Kris into sleep. Because of Tao, he feels as though he is listening to his own personal lullaby.
“Wu Fan,” Tao moans his name contentedly. It’s enough to rouse Kris from his almost slumber. Are his ears deceiving him? A moan. Tao fucking moaned and it’s because of him. “So warm, my precious Wu Fan,” Tao moans again. Yes, Kris thinks, warm and sweet and delicious. And, oh my God, he called him precious. Kris wants to squirm with glee. People don’t usually call him precious.
“So lovely,” Tao sighs and lets his mouth fall open into a loose grin. His sigh sounds so content, so angelic and gorgeous and beautiful that Kris can’t control himself any longer. He lets himself do what he’s always restrained from doing before. He wraps his arm around Tao’s waist and inches closer until he’s so close to Tao’s face that he feels like he’s standing with his face pressed against a big, flat screen T.V. The proximity of their faces is so close that he can’t see anything but Tao’s eyes, nose, and his beautiful, slightly open mouth. Everything is in high definition. The way he smells, the hardly noticeable blemishes on his face, the feeling of Tao’s soft breathe against his cheeks.
After all the nights of stifling desire, Kris lets himself kiss Tao’s lips softly and graze his lips across Tao’s cheek. He must be careful not to wake him if he wants to continue. Finally Kris gets to kiss Tao’s pretty little eyelids and nose and cheeks a million times, and in between each of those kisses he always returns back to Tao’s mouth. Sometimes he just kisses Tao tenderly, other times gently nibbles that succulent lower lip, and occasionally gets daring enough to lick it. To Kris, this is as close to eating the chocolate chip cookie that he can afford to get right now. The taste of Tao in his mouth is better than any cookie Kris will ever eat and it makes him want more, but he doesn’t dare move his hands along Tao’s body for fear that he will wake him.
In the darkness and security of his own bed, he continues to kiss every centimeter of Tao’s perfect face. Every now and then he swallow Tao’s contented sighs and moans. Every whisper of his name and dreamy comment about how gorgeous and wonderful and amazing Kris apparently is, fill Kris up and make him feel heady and heavy. Until Kris can hardly keeps his eyes open any longer he eats up all of Tao’s words, swallowing, kissing, and licking until he feels so full that he almost can’t do it anymore. With an arm securely wrapped around Tao’s waist and his face so close to Tao’s that they are almost touching, Kris finally succumbs to his own lovely dreamland filled with Tao.
Even in the morning when he wakes up to find that Tao has slipped out of his bed, he still feels content and certain of his place in Tao’s heart. A gleam of determination sets place in his eyes. Maybe not today, but soon he’s going to tell Tao how he feels. When the two of them are alone together, maybe the next time Tao slips into his bed, he’s going to say it. He’s going to admit just how much he’s in love with Tao and kiss him and hold him and touch him until Tao admits it too. After last night, he knows that Tao must like him. So many happy sigh, whispers and compliments. And the moaning.
Kris remembers every single one of the noises that escaped from Tao’s lips right down to the moans and he vows never to forget them. In fact, maybe he’ll even use them to his advantage to tease Tao before he admits to liking him. Secretly, he wants Tao to suffer as he has. Something about making Tao lust after him feels justifying and delicious in almost the same way that Kris likes those chocolate chip cookies. Now he just has to think of a way to make his lover sweat enough to come to the realization that he’s in love with him.
But how?
To his surprise he finds that Tao has left his stuffed panda in Kris’s bed. Kris looks at the panda with curiosity for once instead of jealousy. This thing, this panda that Tao for some reason loves so dearly, could be his first step in forcing Tao to come to terms with his feelings. Tao’s “Baekhyun-ie” gave this to him, didn’t he? Or he at least named it, Kris is sure of that. Baekhyun won’t stand a chance against Kris’s newfound determination. In a matter of minutes, Kris has gone from lovey-dovey lustful Kris to naughty Kris and begins to formulate a plan.
“I think it’s time that my Tao forgot all about his Baekhyun-ie,” Kris grins manically.
***
“Xiumin, can you give this back to Tao for me?” Kris hands the stuffed panda over to Minseok after breakfast. He’d taken to calling Minseok by his stage name recently for good measure. They were all supposed to practice getting used to their stage names until it felt like their own original birth name. “And make sure to give him my regards,” Kris snickers. Yes, this is going to go perfectly.
“Ah, this explains a lot,” Minseok nods his head in agreement with some secret suspicion he’s keeping from Kris.
“What do you mean?” Kris questions tentatively but with an uninterested tone.
“After Tao came back into our room this morning he must have come from your room. He wouldn’t shut up about you in his sleep. Something about a male god and wanting a kiss. Well a bit more than a kiss, I think.” Minseok furrows his brow. “Ah, I shouldn’t be tell-”Minseok stops short when he sees the contented grin on Kris’s face.
“I assume you’ve already heard most of it…” Minseok trails off suggestively. Kris nods and lets his grin turn wicked. “Anything in particular you want me to do about it?” he asks, sensing that Kris is all too happy about Tao’s sleep talking and is in a mood to play. Ever since Tao had first snuck into Kris’s bed and wept himself to sleep in Kris’s arms, Minseok could tell that something would eventually happen between them. For some reason, he just never thought that Kris would be the first one to crack and develop feelings. Minseok, while suffering from his own unrequited love, had been watching the two of them closely for months.
“Make him sweat, Minseok-ah,” Kris hums. “He deserves a little suffering after what I’ve been through.”
“Ne,” Minseok smiles in agreement and slightly bows before leaving to get ready for the day. At least this way he can have a bit of fun too instead of constantly wallowing over Luhan. It will be a nice distraction from his broken heart. Unlike Kris, he hadn’t waited to find out if his feelings had been returned. He’d confessed without thinking and regretted it immediately.
The only reason why Luhan acts so cute around him is due to their company’s determination that the fans would love it. Minseok would love it too if he knew that Luhan wasn’t forcing himself to fake it all. With a wicked grin he decides that he’ll help Kris out, but he’ll torture Tao at the same time to satisfy his dejected heart. It’s cruel, yes, but it isn’t like he is going to turn Tao away from Kris. Besides, Kris wants this too and Minseok would certainly assist his leader.
In the evening, after another successful interview in which Tao basically uses Kris’s exact words to describe his ideal type, Kris is able to listen in on the beginning of Tao’s torture. Minseok winks at Kris and waves the panda at him before walking into his shared room with Tao. The other members have already gone to bed so Kris feels no shame in sneaking up to their bedroom door and eavesdropping. Carefully, Kris presses himself against the door until he is certain he cannot get any closer.
Kris can hear it all and almost picture it all. The rough way Minseok hands Tao back his panda courtesy of him. The way he complains about Tao’s nighttime mumbling without really telling him what exactly he said in his sleep. When Tao starts spouting random nonsense in Mandarin and Korean about how never did such a thing, Kris imagines Tao’s face turning a lovely shade of pink. If he kissed him, would his face turn pink, or would it turn bright red and burn his fingers as he stroked Tao’s cheek? Kris is almost hoping it will be the latter. Just like with his chocolate chip cookies, Kris likes to feel the radiating heat.
His favorite part is when Minseok bluntly tells Tao not to sneak out of their room and into Kris’s bed anymore. Now his face must really be red. The sound of Minseok patting Tao on the shoulder and the rustling of cloth warns Kris that Minseok is headed towards the door. Quickly, Kris tiptoes away from the door and sits on the couch. When he sees Minseok walk through the door and give Kris a thumbs-up and walk to the bathroom, Kris snorts with amusement. Kris has to smother his growling giggle with a couch cushion to stop it from spreading throughout the dorm.
“Soon, Tao, I’ll make you realize just how much you want me. I’ll kiss you the way I kissed you in your sleep and you’ll whisper my name into the kiss the way you did in your dreams. One day Tao, you’ll feel just how hungry for me you are,” Kris whispers and smirks into the cushion.
One day, he’ll have his Tao all to himself.