ALL THIS AND HEAVEN TOO for CHOCOYEOL
For: chocoyeol
Title: All this and heaven too
Pairing(s): Chanyeol/Sehun
Rating: PG-13
Warning(s): angst, cancer, illness,[Spoiler]character death
Length: 4284 w
Summary: Chanyeol has fallen from heaven, after trying to change fate to save someone that doesn't want to be saved. Angels!au.
"One of them is yours. Sehun, I think he is.”
Jongdae’s words echo in his head as he makes his way down the hallway.
Chanyeol has never been one to accept destiny. Fate is a bunch of bullshit and he never, for a moment, believe that things should happen just because someone had decided they should.
Which is why he would be stupid enough to risk everything, just to save someone who doesn’t even know he exists. He has a bad habit of becoming too attached to the people he is responsible for guarding: he can’t help but become protective of them, after seeing them being through so much.
He’s sick and tired of seeing people who deserve more to die before their times, and not being able to do anything about it. And now, he’s not gonna put up with that anymore. After all this time, it would worth it to lose everything, if it means saving one person.
If it means saving Sehun.
After walking down the long hallway, he turns into a corner, and stops in front of the last door in the left. He tries the handle which is, unsurprisingly, locked. After throwing his weight on the it several times, it throws wide open and he manages to get in.
The room is enormous, its ceiling so high that he can barely see the delicately painted murals painted on top as he bends his head backward to admire the handiwork. Tall, narrow windows line the wall and sunlight pours out of them, onto the shelves that store the fate of every living human being.
If he has the time he would have stop and marvel at the sight. But time is running out and he has things to do, so he walks down the aisle, looking for the one that has what he need. It takes a while, but at last he finally pulls out the file that he has been searching for.
When he is done, he heads back to the entrance and is ready to slip out of the room. He doesn’t expect anyone to be there, but he is wrong. There is a group of them standing just outside, waiting for him as he steps out.
Out of instinct, Chanyeol almost breaks into a run, but he knows that he would probably get caught before he can get away, so he remains still, and doesn’t protest when they take the folder out of his hand.
Jongdae steps in front of them all to face Chanyeol. "Chanyeol, after all this time you still don't understand." He sighs and shakes his head in defeat. "It's not up to us to decide who gets to live and who dies. It's not about being fair or not. Everything has been written and decided long before any of us had been here. It's beyond our control. We're only responsible for carrying these instructions out."
He speaks calmly, but anyone can hear the fury in his words. “We’ve warned you not to intervene, but you did so anyway. Altering the records is an unspeakable offense. Your actions had been reckless, and could’ve endangered us all. They can’t go unpunished.”
“It must’ve been a mistake! You can’t-”
Before he can finish his sentence, his surroundings vanish without warning. They are replaced with somewhere secluded and quiet, a place with wooden benches and patches of green dotting the sidewalk. It looks like a park, but he isn’t be sure as his vision keeps blurring and coming back into focus.
The world is spinning in circles, and he could barely stay standing with the loud pounding in his head. He tries to steady himself by flapping his wings, but they are not there. Instead of feathers, his hand comes into contact with… nothing. Gone, as if they are never on his back.
He tries to stand up, but the light is in his face and he falls to his knees, too fatigued to support himself on his own two legs. All the strength gone from his body, he resorts to supporting himself on all fours. His knees tremble and his arms are ready to give in, and he collapses onto the ground, the hard concrete digging into his side, but he’s weak, too weak to do anything about it.
Laying on the ground, the last thing he remembers before drifting out of consciousness is a face swimming in and out of focus, whispering words that he cannot decipher.
He wakes up in a bed. Every inch of his body aches, as if he has been in a coma for a while and has just gotten around to waking up. He sits up and leans against the headboard, wincing as pain shoots up the length of his spine.
His wings, they really are gone.
When the time comes, you will have them again.
Even now, the headache that he has had stubbornly remains and the soft ringing still persists in his ears. He tries to get off the bed but even the slightest movements make him grimace in discomfort, and he starts to feel nauseous again.
But he can't stay here and waste time. He has to go and find Sehun and -
"So you've finally woken up. Took you long enough, by the way, you’ve been asleep for two days."
As it turns out, Chanyeol doesn’t have to look for Sehun at all. He’s looking at him right now. He is currently leaning against the door frame, arms crossed across his chest. He has probably been there all along, waiting for Chanyeol to wake up.
Seeing Sehun in front of him, Chanyeol can feel his heart sinking in his chest. He knows exactly why he’s been sent here for, what his punishment is.
He tries to say something, but his throat feels like sandpaper and he ends up doubling over, coughing.
“Stay here. I’ll grab you something to eat, you’re probably starving right now.”
Sehun walks out the room and returns later with a tray in his hands. He sets it onto the bed with great care.
Eyeing the carefully arranged meal, Chanyeol manages to croak out his words. “Thanks, but you don’t have to do this. You could’ve just dump me at a hospital.”
“Don’t worry. It’s not like I have anything else to do anyway.” Without another word Sehun slips out of the room, leaving Chanyeol to ponder over his thoughts.
It takes him several days until he manages to get back on his feet without any help. Though it still takes him some effort as he stumbles his way groggily down the hallway and into the kitchen, where Sehun is slumming on the counter. Under the meek sunlight that is coming through the window, the bags under his eyes become more pronounced and he looks haggard, as if he hasn’t slept in days.
As he enters the kitchen, Sehun acknowledges his presence by nodding his head in the direction of the table. “Not sure if you like coffee, so I made tea.”
Chanyeol reaches for the cup of tea but ends up accidentally knocking the mug over, sending it hurtling off the edge of the table. It hits the floor and breaks into fragments, spilling tea all over.
Without realizing what he’s doing, Chanyeol kneels down and starts picking up pieces of the mug. He is so engrossed in his task that he only stops when he notices the fragments are speckled with crimson liquid, and realizes with a jolt that blood is sliding off his fingers. The shards of the broken cup are so sharp that they have sliced his fingertips opened.
At the sight of his bloody fingers, Sehun hastily snatches a towel off the table and tells him to hold it to his hand to stop the bleeding, while he goes off to find the first aid kit. By the time Sehun comes back, box of bandages in one hand and in the other, the cuts on Chanyeol’s hands have already repaired themselves, leaving the skin smooth and intact.
Eyes flicking from the formerly blood stained towel to Chanyeol’s now undamaged hands, Sehun looks up and Chanyeol can see the confusion forming in his face. "Is there something you're not telling me?"
They are standing on the rooftop of the building, overlooking Seoul. What little sun that had been there has disappeared behind the clouds, blanketing the sky in shades of ash and soot. The two of them are near the very edge, leaning on the railings and the pipes.
Still in disbelief of what he had just been told, Sehun pulls out a pack of smokes from his jacket pocket and takes one out. He tries to light his cigarette which, much to his annoyance, is very difficult to do with a shaking hand. After it finally lights up, he takes a deep long drag and tilts his head upward, blowing smoke into the air. “This whole angels is still kind of creeping me out. Also, the whole having a guardian angel watching over me thing? It’s just a lot to digest in one day.”
Chanyeol, not knowing what to say, does not reply, so Sehun continues. “You don’t have to do this for me, you know. It’s not worth it. It’s gonna happen sooner or later anyway, so it might as well as be now.“
Chanyeol tears his eyes from the ground to face the boy standing next to him. “It’s not too late, there’s still time. If you start treatment now you might just live to see another day.”
Sehun cackles drily. “To do what? So I can get diagnosed with something even more terminal? A brain tumor is bad enough as it is.”
If he doesn’t know any better, he would try convincing Sehun that everything would be okay, that they could still find a way to put things right and that things would just be alright again. But Chanyeol knows that he had already been told these same things so many times that they don’t mean anything, not anymore. "How can you be so calm when you know you're going to die? Why do you just accept it?"
Sehun crouches down and plops himself next to Chanyeol. Blowing smoke rings into the air, it takes some time before he finally replies. "Maybe I'm tired. Maybe I'm sick of the same shit happening to me over and over again, and having no ways to stop it. Maybe I'm figured that life is not worth living anymore, not when you wake up every day wondering if today's the day that they find out something's wrong with you. Again."
He takes a final drag of what remains of his cigarette and flicks it over the edge. “Now I’m finally getting a way out.”
“I hate the way people look at me, wondering when I’m finally going to die. How they treat me like I’m halfway in the coffin already. I’m a burden to everyone around me. My parents dump so much money on me just to keep me alive. They sacrificed almost everything for me, and there’s no way for me to repay them, ever, because I’m just gonna fucking die before I get around to doing anything. I don’t even do anything anymore. I just wake up every day doing the same things over and over, wishing for a miracle to happen and cursing myself for being desperate enough. What’s the point of living if you’re just waiting to die? It’s just easier for me, for everyone if I just snuff it.”
The boy next to him does not look like a boy at all: an old man who has been through too much. He has weathered so many storms that death is preferable than the things that he would have to go through.
Instead of comforting Sehun with empty words that he had heard so often, Chanyeol holds his silence and looks out at the city as Sehun lights another cigarette. Neither of them speak and yet both of them are perfect fine with the silence between them. They remain there until it starts to rain, drizzling lightly as first, and then pouring down furiously, raindrops pelting the pavement like bullets.
Even though Chanyeol has gotten significantly better, he stays in that he doesn’t want Sehun to be by himself. The time they spend together they mostly spend without talking, but instead absorbing each other’s presence.
Despite the strong act that Sehun puts up, Chanyeol can still see the sadness lingering beneath the surface, absorbing his being and just waiting to break him into pieces.
The symptoms get worse by the day, turning Sehun into a weak shadow of the person he used to be. What sleep he used to get are now spent writhing in bed, soaked in sweat. During meals, he barely tries to eat anymore, resorting instead to shift food around on his plate, most of which goes uneaten no matter how much Chanyeol tries to persuade him otherwise.
On multiple occasions, Chanyeol finds him heaving over the toilet, vomiting what little food that he ate.
He is rapidly losing weight. What color he had in his face has now turned a sickening grey.
And then the seizures start. It becomes almost of a routine, for him to find Sehun on the floor, teeth clenched and twisting. When they happen, Chanyeol doesn't know what to do, except to hold Sehun until the episode passes and he eventually comes around.
You cannot change fate. It has to go this way, one life or another.
What if… what if I take his place? Nothing changes. You still get one life, one way or the other.
It goes on like this, the two of them waiting, though waiting for what neither of them knows, until one morning he wakes up and has his wings again. The weight of them drags him down and offsets his balance. He could barely remember why he had missed them, now that he knows what he need them for.
Sehun is curled up on his bed, sheets wrapped around his form. Fast asleep, he looks almost like a child.
Chanyeol runs his fingers through the soft hair and lands a kiss on his forehead. Sehun begins to stir, but is too weak and too tired to actually do so.
He reaches for Sehun’s hand and holds it. Sehun’s shallow breathing eventually comes to a still. And then he is gone, leaving life just as quickly as he had entered it.
It is done. There is nothing else he can do about it.
He feels a hollowness inside, a hollowness great as he has never felt before. It eats him away on the inside, dissolving every bit of his being into nothingness. The tears come thick and fast, blurring his vision. He wipes them away, but they keep running down his face. He has become a faucet of human sorrow that, once turned on, comes gushing out and cannot be turned off.
He has tried so hard to save him, to give him the life that he should have had. And yet he still failed.
He is so absorbed in his grieving that he barely notices as he slips into unconsciousness.
His hair is a mob of dark that appears brown under the sun, bangs so long that they threaten to cover his eyes, with long lashes that flutter when he blinks. His skin a milky white and free of blemishes, his cheeks a rosy glow. He is hovering a few inches off the ground, flapping his wings every so often to keep himself in the air. Despite the fact that he is standing in the middle of a very busy street, no one seems to notice the boy with wings on his back. The busy streets of Seoul are buzzing alive, each pedestrian going off in their own direction, heading to trains to catch, appointments to keep, texts to reply to.
He is moving every minute or so, keeping his distance from the person he is following. His eyes trail after the tall boy walking across the street, who does not seem to be aware that he is being followed. Lost in his own thoughts, he keeps bumping carelessly into people and whispers half-hearted apologies.
All of a sudden, the tall boy falls to the ground. He makes several attempts to get back up, none of them successful.
Sehun is about to rush to him when he feels a tug on his wrist. “Don’t,” says a whisper in his ear, soft as wind yet full of force. He looks over his shoulder and sees a mob of black hair. Jongdae.
Chanyeol eventually stirs, and reassures the passersby that had came to form a circle around him with a laugh. Picking himself up, he brushes himself off and walks off, with Sehun and Jongdae trailing behind him.
"I'm sorry, but I can't let you. I can't let you do this, not when he had given up everything for you." When Sehun doesn’t respond, he continues, "he made a deal, that he would exchange places with you. That’s why you woke up even though you’ve died, and why Chanyeol’s living out the rest of your life for you. Chanyeol, he loves you so much. You really think he could stand seeing you in pain?"
Jongdae sighs, stopping for Sehun to catch up. "I'm sorry. Please don't take it the wrong way. It's just that Chanyeol, he is so important to all of us. You have to wait until the time is right.”
Seeing the confused look on his face, Jongdae adds, "When the time comes, you'll know. You'll feel it."
It takes a while until Sehun finally mumbles. “I just can’t believe he’s stupid enough to do this for me.” He stops briefly to glance at Chanyeol, who is walking several paces ahead of them. “I told him not to. I told him I don’t care, I don’t want to live anymore.”
“He’s like that. He never listens.”
For the second time, Chanyeol collapses onto a ground. His head hits the pavement with a sickening clash. This time he does not so easily get up and instead remains there. People begin to gather around again, trying to figure out if he’s alright.
Sehun did not return Jongdae’s gaze, and instead stares at the pavement tiles, opting to look everywhere else except for those eyes. This time, he does not rush forward to see if Chanyeol is alright.
For the first time, he begins to understand the despair that Chanyeol must have felt, seeing things happen to the people he cared about and having no ways to stop them from happening.
Someone among the crowd whips out her phone and calls the hospital. The sound of the ambulance grows louder as it gets closer and closer.
Leaving Jongdae there, he stalks away from the scene, turns around the corner and vanishes.
From what he can tell from his medical records, he was diagnosed with his tumor five months ago. The doctor says he doesn't have much time left. Two, three months. Five, at most.
One of the most severe of the symptoms is memory loss. It begins with the smaller, mundane things, like forgetting where he put his subway pass, and then he starts getting lost on his way from his house to the hospital. The things that he thought he would never forget are now slipping from his grasp, and no matter how hard he tries to remember, he can only recall the smallest bits and fragments.
Days fly by, and then weeks. It becomes difficult to differentiate one day from the other. They are all a blur of hospital visits and therapy sessions that his family insisted him on having, even though he had repeatedly turned them down.
During the sessions, he mostly sits in his armchair and stares out the window. After several unsuccessful attempts, the therapist stops asking him why he refuses to talk and mostly leaves him to his solitude.
Not long until he can see Sehun again.
He can’t walk ever since he lost coordination. He can no longer walk without having someone to lean on. They all agreed that it would just be safer to keep him in the hospital. Eventually, it narrows down to just his room. His everyday life is now confined to white tiles, harsh synthetic lighting and cold stainless steel.
Chanyeol doesn't protest. As much as he hates being trapped inside a hospital for what’s left of his life, he could barely walk, let alone going anywhere for that matter.
His memories have become an indistinguishable mush. Last Tuesday becomes yesterday and morphs into a late April afternoon from years ago. He would reminiscent of something he thought was from not so long before only to be told that it happened ages ago.
The only thing that's certain in his mind is a name. A name that, for some reason, got stuck in his head and refuses to be forgotten. He keeps asking around, hoping to eventually to find an answer that would satisfy his curiosity, but no one seems to know an Oh Sehun.
It's probably no one important. Just a name that he ran across in the paper or something.
He spends most of his time sleeping. Reading have become impossible as words don’t make sense, not anymore, no matter how much he tries to wrap his head around them. Anything that requires focus has been difficult to do. It is a struggle to concentrate on anything without having his mind wandering something else completely unrelated.
So he sleeps. He sleeps to forget, to escape. He sleeps to convince himself that some time, some place, there would be a place where everything would go back to normal . He sleeps to get away from the pain.
Sometimes, the pain is so great that it is all he could do to keep himself from passing out. The stuff that they pump into him does help, but only so much.
Every time he goes to sleep, he prays that the pain would go away. Every time he goes to sleep, he prays that he won’t wake up.
He could see a soft light glowing in the distance, and a tall figure standing above him. Just before he can make sense of who he is, his sight dims and he is falling, falling into darkness.
When he wakes up, everything that he had ever known is gone. He rakes his mind trying to remember what had happened, yet nothing comes to mind. Every time he thinks he almost remembers something, it turns to be blurry and abstract, nothing concrete. He couldn’t even remember his name. The only thing that he knows for certain is the constant throbbing that is going on in the back of his head.
He is distraught with the headache that is threatening to split his head in half before he notices something else, something heavy on his back. He has wings! Thick heavy things covered in feathers, so white and soft that he can't help but keep touching them. Just to be sure that they really are there.
His childlike eyes glister with wonder as they glide across his surroundings, absorbing every detail. Everything feels oddly familiar, as if he has experienced it all in a lifetime past.
He sits there observing the scenery around him until a boy with snow blonde hair comes to him. He looks the same age as he is and has wings just like him. The boy offers him his hand and pulls him to his feet.
He scrunches his face in concentration. “Do I know you? I think I know you. You look really familiar but I don’t remember cause I have a brain tumor and -”
“Your name is Park Chanyeol.”
Chanyeol, Chanyeol, Chanyeol. The name flows so easily on his tongue that he has no problem believing that it is his name.
"So what's your name?"
The boy’s face turns into a small frown and he is hesitant, though Chanyeol does not notice in his thrill of having a new friend. "Sehun. Oh Sehun."
Oh Sehun. Even the name is familiar. But it doesn’t give Chanyeol any clues as to who Sehun might have been to him other than a sense of deja vu.
Seconds tick by, and then minutes. As time passes by, he could feel this bond forming between them that he can’t quite explain. Neither of them speak, but the silence suits them alright. It is not an uncomfortable silence, but rather the type that you share with people you've known for a long time, those that know you so well that they can read you like a book.
Chanyeol doesn’t know what to do with his hands, so he links his fingers through Oh Sehun’s like he’s been doing this his entire life. Perhaps he has, but at the moment Chanyeol doesn’t really care, because Sehun’s hand is nice and warm and fits just into his own, like it was made for Chanyeol to hold. To his relief, Sehun doesn’t let go and instead holds on tighter.
Sehun is at a lost. He knows that effects of a brain tumor would be severe, but never so bad that Chanyeol would not remember him at all. He doubt he has it in him to burden Chanyeol with the details of everything that has happened between them. At least, not right away. Perhaps he can fills him in as time goes by
After all, they only have all the time in the world.
Final author's note: I didn't really go into it much, but I based Sehun's condition on the Li-Fraumeni syndrome, which is a rare genetic disorder that highly increases a person's chance of developing cancer.
Title: All this and heaven too
Pairing(s): Chanyeol/Sehun
Rating: PG-13
Warning(s): angst, cancer, illness,[Spoiler]character death
Length: 4284 w
Summary: Chanyeol has fallen from heaven, after trying to change fate to save someone that doesn't want to be saved. Angels!au.
"One of them is yours. Sehun, I think he is.”
Jongdae’s words echo in his head as he makes his way down the hallway.
Chanyeol has never been one to accept destiny. Fate is a bunch of bullshit and he never, for a moment, believe that things should happen just because someone had decided they should.
Which is why he would be stupid enough to risk everything, just to save someone who doesn’t even know he exists. He has a bad habit of becoming too attached to the people he is responsible for guarding: he can’t help but become protective of them, after seeing them being through so much.
He’s sick and tired of seeing people who deserve more to die before their times, and not being able to do anything about it. And now, he’s not gonna put up with that anymore. After all this time, it would worth it to lose everything, if it means saving one person.
If it means saving Sehun.
After walking down the long hallway, he turns into a corner, and stops in front of the last door in the left. He tries the handle which is, unsurprisingly, locked. After throwing his weight on the it several times, it throws wide open and he manages to get in.
The room is enormous, its ceiling so high that he can barely see the delicately painted murals painted on top as he bends his head backward to admire the handiwork. Tall, narrow windows line the wall and sunlight pours out of them, onto the shelves that store the fate of every living human being.
If he has the time he would have stop and marvel at the sight. But time is running out and he has things to do, so he walks down the aisle, looking for the one that has what he need. It takes a while, but at last he finally pulls out the file that he has been searching for.
When he is done, he heads back to the entrance and is ready to slip out of the room. He doesn’t expect anyone to be there, but he is wrong. There is a group of them standing just outside, waiting for him as he steps out.
Out of instinct, Chanyeol almost breaks into a run, but he knows that he would probably get caught before he can get away, so he remains still, and doesn’t protest when they take the folder out of his hand.
Jongdae steps in front of them all to face Chanyeol. "Chanyeol, after all this time you still don't understand." He sighs and shakes his head in defeat. "It's not up to us to decide who gets to live and who dies. It's not about being fair or not. Everything has been written and decided long before any of us had been here. It's beyond our control. We're only responsible for carrying these instructions out."
He speaks calmly, but anyone can hear the fury in his words. “We’ve warned you not to intervene, but you did so anyway. Altering the records is an unspeakable offense. Your actions had been reckless, and could’ve endangered us all. They can’t go unpunished.”
“It must’ve been a mistake! You can’t-”
Before he can finish his sentence, his surroundings vanish without warning. They are replaced with somewhere secluded and quiet, a place with wooden benches and patches of green dotting the sidewalk. It looks like a park, but he isn’t be sure as his vision keeps blurring and coming back into focus.
The world is spinning in circles, and he could barely stay standing with the loud pounding in his head. He tries to steady himself by flapping his wings, but they are not there. Instead of feathers, his hand comes into contact with… nothing. Gone, as if they are never on his back.
He tries to stand up, but the light is in his face and he falls to his knees, too fatigued to support himself on his own two legs. All the strength gone from his body, he resorts to supporting himself on all fours. His knees tremble and his arms are ready to give in, and he collapses onto the ground, the hard concrete digging into his side, but he’s weak, too weak to do anything about it.
Laying on the ground, the last thing he remembers before drifting out of consciousness is a face swimming in and out of focus, whispering words that he cannot decipher.
He wakes up in a bed. Every inch of his body aches, as if he has been in a coma for a while and has just gotten around to waking up. He sits up and leans against the headboard, wincing as pain shoots up the length of his spine.
His wings, they really are gone.
When the time comes, you will have them again.
Even now, the headache that he has had stubbornly remains and the soft ringing still persists in his ears. He tries to get off the bed but even the slightest movements make him grimace in discomfort, and he starts to feel nauseous again.
But he can't stay here and waste time. He has to go and find Sehun and -
"So you've finally woken up. Took you long enough, by the way, you’ve been asleep for two days."
As it turns out, Chanyeol doesn’t have to look for Sehun at all. He’s looking at him right now. He is currently leaning against the door frame, arms crossed across his chest. He has probably been there all along, waiting for Chanyeol to wake up.
Seeing Sehun in front of him, Chanyeol can feel his heart sinking in his chest. He knows exactly why he’s been sent here for, what his punishment is.
He tries to say something, but his throat feels like sandpaper and he ends up doubling over, coughing.
“Stay here. I’ll grab you something to eat, you’re probably starving right now.”
Sehun walks out the room and returns later with a tray in his hands. He sets it onto the bed with great care.
Eyeing the carefully arranged meal, Chanyeol manages to croak out his words. “Thanks, but you don’t have to do this. You could’ve just dump me at a hospital.”
“Don’t worry. It’s not like I have anything else to do anyway.” Without another word Sehun slips out of the room, leaving Chanyeol to ponder over his thoughts.
It takes him several days until he manages to get back on his feet without any help. Though it still takes him some effort as he stumbles his way groggily down the hallway and into the kitchen, where Sehun is slumming on the counter. Under the meek sunlight that is coming through the window, the bags under his eyes become more pronounced and he looks haggard, as if he hasn’t slept in days.
As he enters the kitchen, Sehun acknowledges his presence by nodding his head in the direction of the table. “Not sure if you like coffee, so I made tea.”
Chanyeol reaches for the cup of tea but ends up accidentally knocking the mug over, sending it hurtling off the edge of the table. It hits the floor and breaks into fragments, spilling tea all over.
Without realizing what he’s doing, Chanyeol kneels down and starts picking up pieces of the mug. He is so engrossed in his task that he only stops when he notices the fragments are speckled with crimson liquid, and realizes with a jolt that blood is sliding off his fingers. The shards of the broken cup are so sharp that they have sliced his fingertips opened.
At the sight of his bloody fingers, Sehun hastily snatches a towel off the table and tells him to hold it to his hand to stop the bleeding, while he goes off to find the first aid kit. By the time Sehun comes back, box of bandages in one hand and in the other, the cuts on Chanyeol’s hands have already repaired themselves, leaving the skin smooth and intact.
Eyes flicking from the formerly blood stained towel to Chanyeol’s now undamaged hands, Sehun looks up and Chanyeol can see the confusion forming in his face. "Is there something you're not telling me?"
They are standing on the rooftop of the building, overlooking Seoul. What little sun that had been there has disappeared behind the clouds, blanketing the sky in shades of ash and soot. The two of them are near the very edge, leaning on the railings and the pipes.
Still in disbelief of what he had just been told, Sehun pulls out a pack of smokes from his jacket pocket and takes one out. He tries to light his cigarette which, much to his annoyance, is very difficult to do with a shaking hand. After it finally lights up, he takes a deep long drag and tilts his head upward, blowing smoke into the air. “This whole angels is still kind of creeping me out. Also, the whole having a guardian angel watching over me thing? It’s just a lot to digest in one day.”
Chanyeol, not knowing what to say, does not reply, so Sehun continues. “You don’t have to do this for me, you know. It’s not worth it. It’s gonna happen sooner or later anyway, so it might as well as be now.“
Chanyeol tears his eyes from the ground to face the boy standing next to him. “It’s not too late, there’s still time. If you start treatment now you might just live to see another day.”
Sehun cackles drily. “To do what? So I can get diagnosed with something even more terminal? A brain tumor is bad enough as it is.”
If he doesn’t know any better, he would try convincing Sehun that everything would be okay, that they could still find a way to put things right and that things would just be alright again. But Chanyeol knows that he had already been told these same things so many times that they don’t mean anything, not anymore. "How can you be so calm when you know you're going to die? Why do you just accept it?"
Sehun crouches down and plops himself next to Chanyeol. Blowing smoke rings into the air, it takes some time before he finally replies. "Maybe I'm tired. Maybe I'm sick of the same shit happening to me over and over again, and having no ways to stop it. Maybe I'm figured that life is not worth living anymore, not when you wake up every day wondering if today's the day that they find out something's wrong with you. Again."
He takes a final drag of what remains of his cigarette and flicks it over the edge. “Now I’m finally getting a way out.”
“I hate the way people look at me, wondering when I’m finally going to die. How they treat me like I’m halfway in the coffin already. I’m a burden to everyone around me. My parents dump so much money on me just to keep me alive. They sacrificed almost everything for me, and there’s no way for me to repay them, ever, because I’m just gonna fucking die before I get around to doing anything. I don’t even do anything anymore. I just wake up every day doing the same things over and over, wishing for a miracle to happen and cursing myself for being desperate enough. What’s the point of living if you’re just waiting to die? It’s just easier for me, for everyone if I just snuff it.”
The boy next to him does not look like a boy at all: an old man who has been through too much. He has weathered so many storms that death is preferable than the things that he would have to go through.
Instead of comforting Sehun with empty words that he had heard so often, Chanyeol holds his silence and looks out at the city as Sehun lights another cigarette. Neither of them speak and yet both of them are perfect fine with the silence between them. They remain there until it starts to rain, drizzling lightly as first, and then pouring down furiously, raindrops pelting the pavement like bullets.
Even though Chanyeol has gotten significantly better, he stays in that he doesn’t want Sehun to be by himself. The time they spend together they mostly spend without talking, but instead absorbing each other’s presence.
Despite the strong act that Sehun puts up, Chanyeol can still see the sadness lingering beneath the surface, absorbing his being and just waiting to break him into pieces.
The symptoms get worse by the day, turning Sehun into a weak shadow of the person he used to be. What sleep he used to get are now spent writhing in bed, soaked in sweat. During meals, he barely tries to eat anymore, resorting instead to shift food around on his plate, most of which goes uneaten no matter how much Chanyeol tries to persuade him otherwise.
On multiple occasions, Chanyeol finds him heaving over the toilet, vomiting what little food that he ate.
He is rapidly losing weight. What color he had in his face has now turned a sickening grey.
And then the seizures start. It becomes almost of a routine, for him to find Sehun on the floor, teeth clenched and twisting. When they happen, Chanyeol doesn't know what to do, except to hold Sehun until the episode passes and he eventually comes around.
You cannot change fate. It has to go this way, one life or another.
What if… what if I take his place? Nothing changes. You still get one life, one way or the other.
It goes on like this, the two of them waiting, though waiting for what neither of them knows, until one morning he wakes up and has his wings again. The weight of them drags him down and offsets his balance. He could barely remember why he had missed them, now that he knows what he need them for.
Sehun is curled up on his bed, sheets wrapped around his form. Fast asleep, he looks almost like a child.
Chanyeol runs his fingers through the soft hair and lands a kiss on his forehead. Sehun begins to stir, but is too weak and too tired to actually do so.
He reaches for Sehun’s hand and holds it. Sehun’s shallow breathing eventually comes to a still. And then he is gone, leaving life just as quickly as he had entered it.
It is done. There is nothing else he can do about it.
He feels a hollowness inside, a hollowness great as he has never felt before. It eats him away on the inside, dissolving every bit of his being into nothingness. The tears come thick and fast, blurring his vision. He wipes them away, but they keep running down his face. He has become a faucet of human sorrow that, once turned on, comes gushing out and cannot be turned off.
He has tried so hard to save him, to give him the life that he should have had. And yet he still failed.
He is so absorbed in his grieving that he barely notices as he slips into unconsciousness.
His hair is a mob of dark that appears brown under the sun, bangs so long that they threaten to cover his eyes, with long lashes that flutter when he blinks. His skin a milky white and free of blemishes, his cheeks a rosy glow. He is hovering a few inches off the ground, flapping his wings every so often to keep himself in the air. Despite the fact that he is standing in the middle of a very busy street, no one seems to notice the boy with wings on his back. The busy streets of Seoul are buzzing alive, each pedestrian going off in their own direction, heading to trains to catch, appointments to keep, texts to reply to.
He is moving every minute or so, keeping his distance from the person he is following. His eyes trail after the tall boy walking across the street, who does not seem to be aware that he is being followed. Lost in his own thoughts, he keeps bumping carelessly into people and whispers half-hearted apologies.
All of a sudden, the tall boy falls to the ground. He makes several attempts to get back up, none of them successful.
Sehun is about to rush to him when he feels a tug on his wrist. “Don’t,” says a whisper in his ear, soft as wind yet full of force. He looks over his shoulder and sees a mob of black hair. Jongdae.
Chanyeol eventually stirs, and reassures the passersby that had came to form a circle around him with a laugh. Picking himself up, he brushes himself off and walks off, with Sehun and Jongdae trailing behind him.
"I'm sorry, but I can't let you. I can't let you do this, not when he had given up everything for you." When Sehun doesn’t respond, he continues, "he made a deal, that he would exchange places with you. That’s why you woke up even though you’ve died, and why Chanyeol’s living out the rest of your life for you. Chanyeol, he loves you so much. You really think he could stand seeing you in pain?"
Jongdae sighs, stopping for Sehun to catch up. "I'm sorry. Please don't take it the wrong way. It's just that Chanyeol, he is so important to all of us. You have to wait until the time is right.”
Seeing the confused look on his face, Jongdae adds, "When the time comes, you'll know. You'll feel it."
It takes a while until Sehun finally mumbles. “I just can’t believe he’s stupid enough to do this for me.” He stops briefly to glance at Chanyeol, who is walking several paces ahead of them. “I told him not to. I told him I don’t care, I don’t want to live anymore.”
“He’s like that. He never listens.”
For the second time, Chanyeol collapses onto a ground. His head hits the pavement with a sickening clash. This time he does not so easily get up and instead remains there. People begin to gather around again, trying to figure out if he’s alright.
Sehun did not return Jongdae’s gaze, and instead stares at the pavement tiles, opting to look everywhere else except for those eyes. This time, he does not rush forward to see if Chanyeol is alright.
For the first time, he begins to understand the despair that Chanyeol must have felt, seeing things happen to the people he cared about and having no ways to stop them from happening.
Someone among the crowd whips out her phone and calls the hospital. The sound of the ambulance grows louder as it gets closer and closer.
Leaving Jongdae there, he stalks away from the scene, turns around the corner and vanishes.
From what he can tell from his medical records, he was diagnosed with his tumor five months ago. The doctor says he doesn't have much time left. Two, three months. Five, at most.
One of the most severe of the symptoms is memory loss. It begins with the smaller, mundane things, like forgetting where he put his subway pass, and then he starts getting lost on his way from his house to the hospital. The things that he thought he would never forget are now slipping from his grasp, and no matter how hard he tries to remember, he can only recall the smallest bits and fragments.
Days fly by, and then weeks. It becomes difficult to differentiate one day from the other. They are all a blur of hospital visits and therapy sessions that his family insisted him on having, even though he had repeatedly turned them down.
During the sessions, he mostly sits in his armchair and stares out the window. After several unsuccessful attempts, the therapist stops asking him why he refuses to talk and mostly leaves him to his solitude.
Not long until he can see Sehun again.
He can’t walk ever since he lost coordination. He can no longer walk without having someone to lean on. They all agreed that it would just be safer to keep him in the hospital. Eventually, it narrows down to just his room. His everyday life is now confined to white tiles, harsh synthetic lighting and cold stainless steel.
Chanyeol doesn't protest. As much as he hates being trapped inside a hospital for what’s left of his life, he could barely walk, let alone going anywhere for that matter.
His memories have become an indistinguishable mush. Last Tuesday becomes yesterday and morphs into a late April afternoon from years ago. He would reminiscent of something he thought was from not so long before only to be told that it happened ages ago.
The only thing that's certain in his mind is a name. A name that, for some reason, got stuck in his head and refuses to be forgotten. He keeps asking around, hoping to eventually to find an answer that would satisfy his curiosity, but no one seems to know an Oh Sehun.
It's probably no one important. Just a name that he ran across in the paper or something.
He spends most of his time sleeping. Reading have become impossible as words don’t make sense, not anymore, no matter how much he tries to wrap his head around them. Anything that requires focus has been difficult to do. It is a struggle to concentrate on anything without having his mind wandering something else completely unrelated.
So he sleeps. He sleeps to forget, to escape. He sleeps to convince himself that some time, some place, there would be a place where everything would go back to normal . He sleeps to get away from the pain.
Sometimes, the pain is so great that it is all he could do to keep himself from passing out. The stuff that they pump into him does help, but only so much.
Every time he goes to sleep, he prays that the pain would go away. Every time he goes to sleep, he prays that he won’t wake up.
He could see a soft light glowing in the distance, and a tall figure standing above him. Just before he can make sense of who he is, his sight dims and he is falling, falling into darkness.
When he wakes up, everything that he had ever known is gone. He rakes his mind trying to remember what had happened, yet nothing comes to mind. Every time he thinks he almost remembers something, it turns to be blurry and abstract, nothing concrete. He couldn’t even remember his name. The only thing that he knows for certain is the constant throbbing that is going on in the back of his head.
He is distraught with the headache that is threatening to split his head in half before he notices something else, something heavy on his back. He has wings! Thick heavy things covered in feathers, so white and soft that he can't help but keep touching them. Just to be sure that they really are there.
His childlike eyes glister with wonder as they glide across his surroundings, absorbing every detail. Everything feels oddly familiar, as if he has experienced it all in a lifetime past.
He sits there observing the scenery around him until a boy with snow blonde hair comes to him. He looks the same age as he is and has wings just like him. The boy offers him his hand and pulls him to his feet.
He scrunches his face in concentration. “Do I know you? I think I know you. You look really familiar but I don’t remember cause I have a brain tumor and -”
“Your name is Park Chanyeol.”
Chanyeol, Chanyeol, Chanyeol. The name flows so easily on his tongue that he has no problem believing that it is his name.
"So what's your name?"
The boy’s face turns into a small frown and he is hesitant, though Chanyeol does not notice in his thrill of having a new friend. "Sehun. Oh Sehun."
Oh Sehun. Even the name is familiar. But it doesn’t give Chanyeol any clues as to who Sehun might have been to him other than a sense of deja vu.
Seconds tick by, and then minutes. As time passes by, he could feel this bond forming between them that he can’t quite explain. Neither of them speak, but the silence suits them alright. It is not an uncomfortable silence, but rather the type that you share with people you've known for a long time, those that know you so well that they can read you like a book.
Chanyeol doesn’t know what to do with his hands, so he links his fingers through Oh Sehun’s like he’s been doing this his entire life. Perhaps he has, but at the moment Chanyeol doesn’t really care, because Sehun’s hand is nice and warm and fits just into his own, like it was made for Chanyeol to hold. To his relief, Sehun doesn’t let go and instead holds on tighter.
Sehun is at a lost. He knows that effects of a brain tumor would be severe, but never so bad that Chanyeol would not remember him at all. He doubt he has it in him to burden Chanyeol with the details of everything that has happened between them. At least, not right away. Perhaps he can fills him in as time goes by
After all, they only have all the time in the world.
Final author's note: I didn't really go into it much, but I based Sehun's condition on the Li-Fraumeni syndrome, which is a rare genetic disorder that highly increases a person's chance of developing cancer.