24
Unnatural,
jongin/lu han, pg, oneshot. Delirium!AU
n; this wasn't supposed to happen omg it was meant to be really short. like, really. based on the au created in the books of Lauren Oliver, Delirium and Pandemonium (and hana.) forced myself to stop this because i have more important things to focus on. i obviously wrote the end a bit too rushed. i'm sorry it's so sucky :x aus like this deserve so much better.
chemicals gone wrong. neurons misfiring. brain chemistry warped. unnatural.
He’s seventeen when he witnesses his first case of deliria. His neighbor, a fifteen year old girl with wavy brown hair and deep, colorful eyes, is being dragged out of her house by three regulators. She’s pretty strong to be such a small girl, but that’s what the deliria does. It turns you into an animal, it drives you insane and blind, until you’re something wild and out of control.
She’s kicking and screaming and the tears streaming down her face are heartbreaking. Then, Lu Han stops mid-thought.
no, no they’re not.
She brought the sickness upon herself. This is what happens to people who are infected by it, this is what she deserves, what’s best for her. He’s not supposed to feel pity for her. He’s not supposed to feel anything, in fact.
His mother, still wearing her pink apron around her thin waist, grips his wrist and drags him far from the window. His heart is racing within his ribcage, as if trying to dig his way out through his flesh and bone. The way it beats makes him feel sick.
“Go to your room, and don’t come down until I call you for dinner.” She tells him, with the same tone of voice she uses, void of energy, not a single glimpse of worry in her words. She’s not angry, of course she is not, she’s just not pleased she had to leave the kitchen.
He does as he is told, even though the curiosity won’t stop prickling at his nape. He remembers he’d once seen her on his way back from school, and how she had let her hair fall out of her ponytail and then shook her head to let the strands of hair dance freely, finally out of the rubber band.
A red light flashes in his head. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
He wills himself to stop his trail of thought. It’s dangerous, and he knows how risky it is to notice all these things he sees. He locks the door of his room and drags the chair in front of his desk. He slumps heavily on it, sighing tiredly.
The next day, he groans when his alarm goes off and five minutes after it, his mother is knocking exasperatedly on his door. He leaves for school twenty minutes before eight, and walks to the bus stop a few blocks away from his house, right where the neighborhood ended. His family owns a car, and he could drive all the way to school if he wanted, but he enjoys bus rides.
He knows that’s wrong, too, of course. One’s not supposed to find beauty in mundane things like those. Not the kind of beauty Lu Han sees, anyway. But he’s still uncured, and he can’t help himself but drown in the blissful quietness of the bus, the low humming of it.
Lu Han allows himself to take such risks, but mostly because he’s close to his eighteenth birthday and then, his life will be secure and carefully planned, mapped out in front of him.
He gets to school on time, as per usual. He goes through his classes like every other day. He talks to his friends, he eats the tasteless food of the cafeteria. He talks about the same, boring topics, he fakes smiles and tries to shoo away the immense boredom that is about to choke him.
It’s not until the end of the school day that the conversation with his best friend, Yixing, turns a little illegal.
“I heard about your neighbor. She got caught holding hands with this guy from second ye-”
“Shh, not in public!” He hisses. Yixing waves his hand dismissively, and grins.
“We’re alone. I think you knew the guy,” Yixing continues, “he played football, too.”
They’re walking towards Yixing’s house, who is not so far from school, but still a few blocks downtown. The sun is glaring down at them, touching the exposed skin aggressively. It only motivates Lu Han to speed up and walk faster. The streets are mostly empty, because they had stayed in school to take some books from the library.
“I didn’t catch his name.” Lu Han blankly answers.
“Are you in a bad mood?” Yixing asks, and Lu Han can tell he’s not going to tease him. It’s been normal these days, that he gets crabby and snappy, and then the next minute he’s back to normal, which is just as bad.
“I’m- I’m alright. Just tired, I guess.”
Yixing doesn’t push it. They walk in silence, until they reach the front of Yixing’s house. “A new family is moving in next door.” he announces, and wrinkles his nose towards the house on his right. “They have a kid our age.”
Lu Han knows his best friend, and normally Yixing’s a pretty friendly, warm person, but judging by the way his tone of voice went from tired to irritated, the kid he’s talking about must be not exactly pleasant to meet.
"Why are you snarling like that?" Lu Han asks while Yixing is still unlocking his front door. The house is empty, as usual. Yixing's parents work for the government, and as far as he remembers, his dad is member of the DFA, the organization that is in charge of complete invalid extermination. Deliria Free America.
"There's something strange about him and his family. They act so weird all the time." Yixing tells him once they're up in his room. Lu Han's been there way too many times to feel intrusive, so he just simply pushes off his sneakers and sits on the furry carpet next to the bed.
"You're weird. How can you judge your new neighbors like that?" Lu Han asks, a slightly spark of amusement visible on his features. That's another risk of being uncured, one of his teachers told him. You shouldn't find things so openly entertaining. You're putting everyone in danger.
Lu Han stops the smile creeping on his face at the same time he wills that thought out of his mind.
"I just know, okay. You'll see what I mean when you see one of them." Yixing tells him, and he decides to let the topic drop for good.
Lu Han meets Jongin one week after that afternoon. He carries his tray with both hands, walking next to Yixing, making their way through the cafeteria. The place is packed. Lu Han feels uncomfortable and uneasy just bumping bodies with everyone around him. Although they attend a school for boys only, such physical contact isn’t encouraged; not even among boys.
"Hey, Yixing!" A voice calls behind them. Lu Han stops his pace, too, and turns to face the source of the voice, even though no one had called his name. He can feel Yixing tense next to him.
The boy he sees in front of him takes his breath away, and for a brief moment he thinks this is it, this is my last breath--
But then he pulls more air into his lungs and he's fine again.
He can't tear his eyes away from that stranger. Lu Han doesn't want to think about it, but the more he tries to resist, the louder his thoughts get. He tries to focus on his surely tasteless food, getting colder as time passes in front of them.
“Hey, Jongin.” Yixing greets. “Glad to finally see you here!” His best friend feigns a whole conversation with his neighbor, before the attention falls upon him.
“This is my best friend, Lu Han.” Yixing announces, pointing at him. Lu Han finally looks up and meets the boy’s almond colored eyes. His words get stuck in his throat, as a loud, resigned voice in his head claims what he’s been trying to deny.
He’s beautiful.
He’s different, doesn’t look like he came out from a factory of perfectly manufactured humans. His beauty is one of a kind, and it makes Lu Han’s fingertips itch with need, need of exploring Jongin’s honey skin.
“Nice to meet you, I’m Jongin.” He says, voice deliciously deep and controlled. Jongin flashes him a subtle smile; just a mere twitch of his full lips, secretive and furtive. It sends shivers down Lu Han’s spine. Jongin’s got a soft brown skin that demands attention, his hair is messy, yet it’s the right kind of messy. His eyes, Lu Han believes, are the most capturing set of orbs he’s ever seen.
“Likewise.” He croaks out, nodding briefly.
The awkward and highly fake exchange of politeness between Jongin and Yixing continues without him, yet he is able to sense Jongin’s stare lingering on him longer than necessary. Jongin manages to keep that subtle tension going on between them, much to Lu Han’s dismay. His pulse keeps quickening.
One week later, on a thursday, Lu Han gets to school and doesn’t find Yixing in their classroom. He asks a few classmates, a couple of pale, mean looking boys, whether they had seen his friend or not.
“Hasn’t come yet.” They reply, indifferent. It’s only then that he remembers today is the day Yixing’s examination was scheduled, and it was supposed to be early in the morning, which meant Yixing wouldn’t make it to school that day. He sighs, finds his seat and tries to recall other friends to spend some time with in between classes.
When he goes to the cafeteria, he spots a vacant table near one of the windows. He brings his tray and has his backpack slung across his shoulder, entertaining the idea of catching up with some homework.
“Morning.” He looks up, slightly startled, and meets Jongin’s friendliest smile.
“Hey,” He replies, praying to whichever almighty god that he’s not flustered and red to the tip of his ears. There’s an awkward silence, which Jongin takes advantage of by taking a seat right across Lu Han. Lu Han feels himself shrink, feels everyone of his nerves shoot up and break down afterwards. He doesn’t know what that is, doesn’t know what it means, but he’s sure as hell it’s not normal.
“Yixing didn’t come?” Jongin asks, and then proceeds to take a bite of his sandwich. Lu Han shakes his head, in fear his voice will come out as a tiny squeak if he parts his lips. “Oh, is he sick?”
Lu Han clears his throat, which makes one of Jongin’s eyebrows arch a little. He tries to find his words again.
“Examination day. He’s at the labs. Sorry.” He hopes Jongin will simply thank him and stand up, since Yixing, whom he wanted to talk to, wasn’t there.
“It’s cool,” Jongin begins, and almost instantly, an alarm is set off in Lu Han’s mind. That is not right. It’s not a proper word to use, everyone knows that. “I wanted to talk to you, anyway.” It’s stupid, Lu Han knows, but his mind is not able to process those words. His brain overpowers and he can’t stop himself. He’s smiling. There’s blood rushing to his face, storming in his cheeks.
Lu Han is lost in his own labyrinth of wrong and right before he can take notice of this. In spite of that, Lu Han knows he’s taken more paths of the wrong side, and finds himself waving off the alarmed thoughts he oftens bumps into.
He’s lost, but he’s never been so alive before. He’s never felt so full of emotions, and he discovers how to let go of them. He unleashes his fears and his doubts and doesn’t stop the tears rushing down his face when he cries at night. He’s allowing himself to feel, which is against many rules of The Book of Shhh.
He meets up with Jongin on a regular basis now. Yixing doesn’t know, and Lu Han isn’t sure if he should tell his best friend. He isn’t sure if they’re still best friends, because Yixing never knew the real Lu Han. Yixing never got to meet Lu Han, who liked to sing, who enjoyed horror movies they weren’t allowed to watch, who liked the cold weather and enjoyed getting soaked in the rain. Jongin was the only one who knew him like that.
“I think there’s something really wrong with us.” Lu Han says one afternoon, when he’s lying on Jongin’s bed, using his arms as a pillow. He told his parents and Yixing that he’d spend a few hours at the library across the city, so they wouldn’t get worried. He made sure Yixing hadn’t seen him from his house when he sneaked into Jongin’s.
“What do you mean ‘wrong’?” Jongin asks, chuckling aloud. Their whole bodies are touching, side by side. Jongin’s socked toes curl and tickle Lu Han’s feet. Their elbows are bumping uncomfortably, but neither of them wish to fix this.
“This is not normal, you know?” Lu Han tries not to sound scared, but his voice sounds like a fragile string of sound, and Jongin knows that he is scared.
“It’s perfectly normal.”
Although he knows he’s in danger, that he’s infected with deliria, Lu Han is aware of what is worse than getting sick of it. It’s Jongin who infected him. It’s Jongin who got him lost and brought the life to him, it’s Jongin that taught him how to feel and not to be afraid of it. “It’s not a sickness, Lu Han. This society is so wrong. We are humans, we have emotions. It’s only normal that we are afraid or we fall in love. Love is not a sin, much less a sickness.”
“But we, we are both--”
“Don’t be afraid. Love doesn’t know about genders, Lu Han. I know it must be hard to understand for you. I know you grew up and were raised as a clean citizen, but you were taught wrong. The entire city has been taught wrong.”
“We are Unnaturals.” Lu Han simply states, and he can barely see through the tears.
“We are perfectly natural. We’re just in love.”
Lu Han believed him. It was true, he knew better than any other person in the DFA or the government.
Lu Han is two months away from his procedure day, less known as his birthday. He can’t help but feel anxious, wanting to be free from the constant and growing worry of being sick. Lu Han knows there’s something wrong in him, because no one ever stops at the middle of the bridge to appreciate the magnificent view it gives. No one ever sits under a tree, rips a small piece of grass off the ground and notices the texture, the vivid color it holds.
Lu Han appreciates beauty, and for that, he’s doomed. The cure is his only salvation.
That’s what he used to believe, anyway.
His only salvation right now is running as fast as he can. There’s a jolt of pain running up his leg bones every time he pushes into the ground. It causes his vision to black out for a brief second, but then the colors flood back in and he’s pushing gigantic leaves aside, running through a mass of dense green to save his life.
He hears a ragged breath close behind him, strong footsteps stepping on tree branches, and then he remembers why he’s here- the reason he chose all of this, the pain, the danger, the exclusion.
Jongin.
It broke down upon him the day they kissed for the first time. It had been out of the blue, because Lu Han had accidentally leaned in too close and Jongin had been conveniently slow. The sudden realization had made his breath hitch and his heart stop abruptly. A brief brush of lips, Jongin’s breath ghosting over his skin. Lu Han had never thought something so small, so simple, could make his entire universe shake up a little.
He was an unnatural.
Maybe he had known this all of his life. There had always been something wrong with him. He couldn't exactly tell what, if the strange spark of life in his round eyes, or the way his eyes captured the world, stealing every color, every detail. There was an error running through his veins and he had ignored it all his life, patiently waiting for the day the malfunction of his system would be erradicated through the procedure.
But now he knew for sure. No procedure could fix him, no cure could get things back into their place.
Jongin had made him swear he wouldn't tell anyone. The way Lu Han's frantic hearbeat agreed with Jongin's words were enough proof for Lu Han to trust the olive skin boy.
"I'm an Invalid." Jongin had carefully said, measuring his words with his short, fearful breaths. Lu Han felt a wave of panic flood through him. It was breaking him a part. "The mark of the procedure," Jongin paused, and pointed at the small scar behind his ear, on the path that lead towards his neck, "it's fake. I'm not cured."
Lu Han nodded. There were no words that could make correct emphasis of his feelings.
Jongin continued, "I'm a part of the resistance. My family, they are invalids, too, and we were assigned for an undercover mission." It slowly registers into Lu Han's brain. He lived near the president of the DFA. He skipped classes and broke curfew hours and he never even mentioned his selected matches to marry in the future. He wasn't cured.
Jongin's bright and furtive smiles. The mischievous glint in his eyes, the way he seemed to breathe air in and feel like he owned it, all for himself. Jongin was infected with amor deliria nervosa.
No, he corrects himself. Jongin was able to feel and love and hate.
"I'm sorry I lied to you," Jongin says after Lu Han hasn't replied for a couple of minutes, "I had to."
"Let's run away." Is the first thing Lu Han blurts out. Jongin only squeezes his hand and beams at him. He enjoys the whirlwind of calmness that embraces him as soon as Jongin's skin meets his, closes his eyes and forgets about the world.
He lets out a choked gasp once they stumble out of the tangled mess of leaves and branches. Jongin stops next to him, panting and coughing. The sun is rising on the clear sky, and that's how he knows that they've been running for hours. His eyes roam the place once he’s able to focus. They’re currently standing on a clear, the ground is free of bushes but there are small, shy flowers blossoming every few steps. The trees they had been running through for hours are circling the clear, acting as a shield. Lu Han blindly reaches out to hold Jongin’s hand and links their fingers.
They’re free. They’re in the Wilds. No rules, no cures, no raids.
"...I think we made it."
These words, they danced perfectly and synchronously around his ears, slipping through the melody of Jongin's words. Lu Han laughs, loud and hoarse and doesn't hold back at all.
It hurts to breathe, and each intake of oxygen burns his throat and chest.
But he's laughing, and Jongin is laughing with him.
It hadn’t been easy. The resistance had helped them both break through security guards and regulators. The resistance had previously planned to break into the city, and Jongin’s parents, who Lu Han had late discovered weren’t his real parents, told them to take advantage of the chaos and escape.
And now they’re on their own. Lu Han is tired to the bone and Jongin is, too, but neither of them can’t bring themselves to worry over this. The hunger, the exhaustion, it can hold on a little longer.
They walk the rest of the day, taking small breaks when they find appropriate places. They find a small waterfall, and the remnants of a city that was destroyed years ago, during the blitz.
“The government thinks they eradicated us all. They have no idea how strong the resistance is.” Jongin tells him when they’re walking on a wide, broken in half street. Lu Han isn’t able to walk on his own when they find the homestead.
Lu Han instinctively lets go of Jongin’s hand once they step into the room. There’s a bunch of people, on the floor, on wooden chairs, sharing a bag of chips. Jongin looks for his hand when he starts speaking, and holds it even tighter than before. The group consists of both men and women and something like panic rises and then dies in Lu Han’s throat.
Jongin turns his head to look at him and smiles warmly. The look on his eyes tells him everything.
It’s okay. This is what we came here for. Freedom.
jongin/lu han, pg, oneshot. Delirium!AU
n; this wasn't supposed to happen omg it was meant to be really short. like, really. based on the au created in the books of Lauren Oliver, Delirium and Pandemonium (and hana.) forced myself to stop this because i have more important things to focus on. i obviously wrote the end a bit too rushed. i'm sorry it's so sucky :x aus like this deserve so much better.
chemicals gone wrong. neurons misfiring. brain chemistry warped. unnatural.
He’s seventeen when he witnesses his first case of deliria. His neighbor, a fifteen year old girl with wavy brown hair and deep, colorful eyes, is being dragged out of her house by three regulators. She’s pretty strong to be such a small girl, but that’s what the deliria does. It turns you into an animal, it drives you insane and blind, until you’re something wild and out of control.
She’s kicking and screaming and the tears streaming down her face are heartbreaking. Then, Lu Han stops mid-thought.
no, no they’re not.
She brought the sickness upon herself. This is what happens to people who are infected by it, this is what she deserves, what’s best for her. He’s not supposed to feel pity for her. He’s not supposed to feel anything, in fact.
His mother, still wearing her pink apron around her thin waist, grips his wrist and drags him far from the window. His heart is racing within his ribcage, as if trying to dig his way out through his flesh and bone. The way it beats makes him feel sick.
“Go to your room, and don’t come down until I call you for dinner.” She tells him, with the same tone of voice she uses, void of energy, not a single glimpse of worry in her words. She’s not angry, of course she is not, she’s just not pleased she had to leave the kitchen.
He does as he is told, even though the curiosity won’t stop prickling at his nape. He remembers he’d once seen her on his way back from school, and how she had let her hair fall out of her ponytail and then shook her head to let the strands of hair dance freely, finally out of the rubber band.
A red light flashes in his head. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
He wills himself to stop his trail of thought. It’s dangerous, and he knows how risky it is to notice all these things he sees. He locks the door of his room and drags the chair in front of his desk. He slumps heavily on it, sighing tiredly.
The next day, he groans when his alarm goes off and five minutes after it, his mother is knocking exasperatedly on his door. He leaves for school twenty minutes before eight, and walks to the bus stop a few blocks away from his house, right where the neighborhood ended. His family owns a car, and he could drive all the way to school if he wanted, but he enjoys bus rides.
He knows that’s wrong, too, of course. One’s not supposed to find beauty in mundane things like those. Not the kind of beauty Lu Han sees, anyway. But he’s still uncured, and he can’t help himself but drown in the blissful quietness of the bus, the low humming of it.
Lu Han allows himself to take such risks, but mostly because he’s close to his eighteenth birthday and then, his life will be secure and carefully planned, mapped out in front of him.
He gets to school on time, as per usual. He goes through his classes like every other day. He talks to his friends, he eats the tasteless food of the cafeteria. He talks about the same, boring topics, he fakes smiles and tries to shoo away the immense boredom that is about to choke him.
It’s not until the end of the school day that the conversation with his best friend, Yixing, turns a little illegal.
“I heard about your neighbor. She got caught holding hands with this guy from second ye-”
“Shh, not in public!” He hisses. Yixing waves his hand dismissively, and grins.
“We’re alone. I think you knew the guy,” Yixing continues, “he played football, too.”
They’re walking towards Yixing’s house, who is not so far from school, but still a few blocks downtown. The sun is glaring down at them, touching the exposed skin aggressively. It only motivates Lu Han to speed up and walk faster. The streets are mostly empty, because they had stayed in school to take some books from the library.
“I didn’t catch his name.” Lu Han blankly answers.
“Are you in a bad mood?” Yixing asks, and Lu Han can tell he’s not going to tease him. It’s been normal these days, that he gets crabby and snappy, and then the next minute he’s back to normal, which is just as bad.
“I’m- I’m alright. Just tired, I guess.”
Yixing doesn’t push it. They walk in silence, until they reach the front of Yixing’s house. “A new family is moving in next door.” he announces, and wrinkles his nose towards the house on his right. “They have a kid our age.”
Lu Han knows his best friend, and normally Yixing’s a pretty friendly, warm person, but judging by the way his tone of voice went from tired to irritated, the kid he’s talking about must be not exactly pleasant to meet.
"Why are you snarling like that?" Lu Han asks while Yixing is still unlocking his front door. The house is empty, as usual. Yixing's parents work for the government, and as far as he remembers, his dad is member of the DFA, the organization that is in charge of complete invalid extermination. Deliria Free America.
"There's something strange about him and his family. They act so weird all the time." Yixing tells him once they're up in his room. Lu Han's been there way too many times to feel intrusive, so he just simply pushes off his sneakers and sits on the furry carpet next to the bed.
"You're weird. How can you judge your new neighbors like that?" Lu Han asks, a slightly spark of amusement visible on his features. That's another risk of being uncured, one of his teachers told him. You shouldn't find things so openly entertaining. You're putting everyone in danger.
Lu Han stops the smile creeping on his face at the same time he wills that thought out of his mind.
"I just know, okay. You'll see what I mean when you see one of them." Yixing tells him, and he decides to let the topic drop for good.
Lu Han meets Jongin one week after that afternoon. He carries his tray with both hands, walking next to Yixing, making their way through the cafeteria. The place is packed. Lu Han feels uncomfortable and uneasy just bumping bodies with everyone around him. Although they attend a school for boys only, such physical contact isn’t encouraged; not even among boys.
"Hey, Yixing!" A voice calls behind them. Lu Han stops his pace, too, and turns to face the source of the voice, even though no one had called his name. He can feel Yixing tense next to him.
The boy he sees in front of him takes his breath away, and for a brief moment he thinks this is it, this is my last breath--
But then he pulls more air into his lungs and he's fine again.
He can't tear his eyes away from that stranger. Lu Han doesn't want to think about it, but the more he tries to resist, the louder his thoughts get. He tries to focus on his surely tasteless food, getting colder as time passes in front of them.
“Hey, Jongin.” Yixing greets. “Glad to finally see you here!” His best friend feigns a whole conversation with his neighbor, before the attention falls upon him.
“This is my best friend, Lu Han.” Yixing announces, pointing at him. Lu Han finally looks up and meets the boy’s almond colored eyes. His words get stuck in his throat, as a loud, resigned voice in his head claims what he’s been trying to deny.
He’s beautiful.
He’s different, doesn’t look like he came out from a factory of perfectly manufactured humans. His beauty is one of a kind, and it makes Lu Han’s fingertips itch with need, need of exploring Jongin’s honey skin.
“Nice to meet you, I’m Jongin.” He says, voice deliciously deep and controlled. Jongin flashes him a subtle smile; just a mere twitch of his full lips, secretive and furtive. It sends shivers down Lu Han’s spine. Jongin’s got a soft brown skin that demands attention, his hair is messy, yet it’s the right kind of messy. His eyes, Lu Han believes, are the most capturing set of orbs he’s ever seen.
“Likewise.” He croaks out, nodding briefly.
The awkward and highly fake exchange of politeness between Jongin and Yixing continues without him, yet he is able to sense Jongin’s stare lingering on him longer than necessary. Jongin manages to keep that subtle tension going on between them, much to Lu Han’s dismay. His pulse keeps quickening.
One week later, on a thursday, Lu Han gets to school and doesn’t find Yixing in their classroom. He asks a few classmates, a couple of pale, mean looking boys, whether they had seen his friend or not.
“Hasn’t come yet.” They reply, indifferent. It’s only then that he remembers today is the day Yixing’s examination was scheduled, and it was supposed to be early in the morning, which meant Yixing wouldn’t make it to school that day. He sighs, finds his seat and tries to recall other friends to spend some time with in between classes.
When he goes to the cafeteria, he spots a vacant table near one of the windows. He brings his tray and has his backpack slung across his shoulder, entertaining the idea of catching up with some homework.
“Morning.” He looks up, slightly startled, and meets Jongin’s friendliest smile.
“Hey,” He replies, praying to whichever almighty god that he’s not flustered and red to the tip of his ears. There’s an awkward silence, which Jongin takes advantage of by taking a seat right across Lu Han. Lu Han feels himself shrink, feels everyone of his nerves shoot up and break down afterwards. He doesn’t know what that is, doesn’t know what it means, but he’s sure as hell it’s not normal.
“Yixing didn’t come?” Jongin asks, and then proceeds to take a bite of his sandwich. Lu Han shakes his head, in fear his voice will come out as a tiny squeak if he parts his lips. “Oh, is he sick?”
Lu Han clears his throat, which makes one of Jongin’s eyebrows arch a little. He tries to find his words again.
“Examination day. He’s at the labs. Sorry.” He hopes Jongin will simply thank him and stand up, since Yixing, whom he wanted to talk to, wasn’t there.
“It’s cool,” Jongin begins, and almost instantly, an alarm is set off in Lu Han’s mind. That is not right. It’s not a proper word to use, everyone knows that. “I wanted to talk to you, anyway.” It’s stupid, Lu Han knows, but his mind is not able to process those words. His brain overpowers and he can’t stop himself. He’s smiling. There’s blood rushing to his face, storming in his cheeks.
Lu Han is lost in his own labyrinth of wrong and right before he can take notice of this. In spite of that, Lu Han knows he’s taken more paths of the wrong side, and finds himself waving off the alarmed thoughts he oftens bumps into.
He’s lost, but he’s never been so alive before. He’s never felt so full of emotions, and he discovers how to let go of them. He unleashes his fears and his doubts and doesn’t stop the tears rushing down his face when he cries at night. He’s allowing himself to feel, which is against many rules of The Book of Shhh.
He meets up with Jongin on a regular basis now. Yixing doesn’t know, and Lu Han isn’t sure if he should tell his best friend. He isn’t sure if they’re still best friends, because Yixing never knew the real Lu Han. Yixing never got to meet Lu Han, who liked to sing, who enjoyed horror movies they weren’t allowed to watch, who liked the cold weather and enjoyed getting soaked in the rain. Jongin was the only one who knew him like that.
“I think there’s something really wrong with us.” Lu Han says one afternoon, when he’s lying on Jongin’s bed, using his arms as a pillow. He told his parents and Yixing that he’d spend a few hours at the library across the city, so they wouldn’t get worried. He made sure Yixing hadn’t seen him from his house when he sneaked into Jongin’s.
“What do you mean ‘wrong’?” Jongin asks, chuckling aloud. Their whole bodies are touching, side by side. Jongin’s socked toes curl and tickle Lu Han’s feet. Their elbows are bumping uncomfortably, but neither of them wish to fix this.
“This is not normal, you know?” Lu Han tries not to sound scared, but his voice sounds like a fragile string of sound, and Jongin knows that he is scared.
“It’s perfectly normal.”
Although he knows he’s in danger, that he’s infected with deliria, Lu Han is aware of what is worse than getting sick of it. It’s Jongin who infected him. It’s Jongin who got him lost and brought the life to him, it’s Jongin that taught him how to feel and not to be afraid of it. “It’s not a sickness, Lu Han. This society is so wrong. We are humans, we have emotions. It’s only normal that we are afraid or we fall in love. Love is not a sin, much less a sickness.”
“But we, we are both--”
“Don’t be afraid. Love doesn’t know about genders, Lu Han. I know it must be hard to understand for you. I know you grew up and were raised as a clean citizen, but you were taught wrong. The entire city has been taught wrong.”
“We are Unnaturals.” Lu Han simply states, and he can barely see through the tears.
“We are perfectly natural. We’re just in love.”
Lu Han believed him. It was true, he knew better than any other person in the DFA or the government.
Lu Han is two months away from his procedure day, less known as his birthday. He can’t help but feel anxious, wanting to be free from the constant and growing worry of being sick. Lu Han knows there’s something wrong in him, because no one ever stops at the middle of the bridge to appreciate the magnificent view it gives. No one ever sits under a tree, rips a small piece of grass off the ground and notices the texture, the vivid color it holds.
Lu Han appreciates beauty, and for that, he’s doomed. The cure is his only salvation.
That’s what he used to believe, anyway.
His only salvation right now is running as fast as he can. There’s a jolt of pain running up his leg bones every time he pushes into the ground. It causes his vision to black out for a brief second, but then the colors flood back in and he’s pushing gigantic leaves aside, running through a mass of dense green to save his life.
He hears a ragged breath close behind him, strong footsteps stepping on tree branches, and then he remembers why he’s here- the reason he chose all of this, the pain, the danger, the exclusion.
Jongin.
It broke down upon him the day they kissed for the first time. It had been out of the blue, because Lu Han had accidentally leaned in too close and Jongin had been conveniently slow. The sudden realization had made his breath hitch and his heart stop abruptly. A brief brush of lips, Jongin’s breath ghosting over his skin. Lu Han had never thought something so small, so simple, could make his entire universe shake up a little.
He was an unnatural.
Maybe he had known this all of his life. There had always been something wrong with him. He couldn't exactly tell what, if the strange spark of life in his round eyes, or the way his eyes captured the world, stealing every color, every detail. There was an error running through his veins and he had ignored it all his life, patiently waiting for the day the malfunction of his system would be erradicated through the procedure.
But now he knew for sure. No procedure could fix him, no cure could get things back into their place.
Jongin had made him swear he wouldn't tell anyone. The way Lu Han's frantic hearbeat agreed with Jongin's words were enough proof for Lu Han to trust the olive skin boy.
"I'm an Invalid." Jongin had carefully said, measuring his words with his short, fearful breaths. Lu Han felt a wave of panic flood through him. It was breaking him a part. "The mark of the procedure," Jongin paused, and pointed at the small scar behind his ear, on the path that lead towards his neck, "it's fake. I'm not cured."
Lu Han nodded. There were no words that could make correct emphasis of his feelings.
Jongin continued, "I'm a part of the resistance. My family, they are invalids, too, and we were assigned for an undercover mission." It slowly registers into Lu Han's brain. He lived near the president of the DFA. He skipped classes and broke curfew hours and he never even mentioned his selected matches to marry in the future. He wasn't cured.
Jongin's bright and furtive smiles. The mischievous glint in his eyes, the way he seemed to breathe air in and feel like he owned it, all for himself. Jongin was infected with amor deliria nervosa.
No, he corrects himself. Jongin was able to feel and love and hate.
"I'm sorry I lied to you," Jongin says after Lu Han hasn't replied for a couple of minutes, "I had to."
"Let's run away." Is the first thing Lu Han blurts out. Jongin only squeezes his hand and beams at him. He enjoys the whirlwind of calmness that embraces him as soon as Jongin's skin meets his, closes his eyes and forgets about the world.
He lets out a choked gasp once they stumble out of the tangled mess of leaves and branches. Jongin stops next to him, panting and coughing. The sun is rising on the clear sky, and that's how he knows that they've been running for hours. His eyes roam the place once he’s able to focus. They’re currently standing on a clear, the ground is free of bushes but there are small, shy flowers blossoming every few steps. The trees they had been running through for hours are circling the clear, acting as a shield. Lu Han blindly reaches out to hold Jongin’s hand and links their fingers.
They’re free. They’re in the Wilds. No rules, no cures, no raids.
"...I think we made it."
These words, they danced perfectly and synchronously around his ears, slipping through the melody of Jongin's words. Lu Han laughs, loud and hoarse and doesn't hold back at all.
It hurts to breathe, and each intake of oxygen burns his throat and chest.
But he's laughing, and Jongin is laughing with him.
It hadn’t been easy. The resistance had helped them both break through security guards and regulators. The resistance had previously planned to break into the city, and Jongin’s parents, who Lu Han had late discovered weren’t his real parents, told them to take advantage of the chaos and escape.
And now they’re on their own. Lu Han is tired to the bone and Jongin is, too, but neither of them can’t bring themselves to worry over this. The hunger, the exhaustion, it can hold on a little longer.
They walk the rest of the day, taking small breaks when they find appropriate places. They find a small waterfall, and the remnants of a city that was destroyed years ago, during the blitz.
“The government thinks they eradicated us all. They have no idea how strong the resistance is.” Jongin tells him when they’re walking on a wide, broken in half street. Lu Han isn’t able to walk on his own when they find the homestead.
Lu Han instinctively lets go of Jongin’s hand once they step into the room. There’s a bunch of people, on the floor, on wooden chairs, sharing a bag of chips. Jongin looks for his hand when he starts speaking, and holds it even tighter than before. The group consists of both men and women and something like panic rises and then dies in Lu Han’s throat.
Jongin turns his head to look at him and smiles warmly. The look on his eyes tells him everything.
It’s okay. This is what we came here for. Freedom.