Tiredly, he lifted himself from the seat he had occupied all throughout the long journey. Tiredly, he yawned and tried to stretch his poor, stiff limbs in that small space without budging too much the passengers next to him. Tiredly, he followed the queue to the closest exit door after retrieving his hand luggage, a lucid black backpack. Tiredly, he even let out a particular groan of frustration while walking down the busy halls of the arrivals terminal of the airport, baggage in hand after the long wait to collect it. Tiredly, he forced himself too much in order to show his cousin a bright smile and fake a good mood.

Yes, fake.

Because everything he did, he did it out of exhaustion towards life, a bitter feeling of resentment he felt pounding so strongly inside his stuffed chest, instead of the heart that his now ex-girlfriend had brutally shattered after cheating on him.

So, when he met with his cousin, who had kindly offered to pick him up - and more generally, suggested him that short vacation trip to the US - Kyuhyun didn't look very excited.

But it wasn't because he didn't like his relative - Siwon was his favorite cousin anyway - or because he wished to be anywhere else but there...it was simply because his mind couldn't keep from thinking of the grave mistakes made in order to run after an unworthy girl like his ex was. Just thinking that he was even ready to swear undying love to her before the altar, despite his young age - twenty-three - and his parents' unfavorable opinion, made his blood boil in rage. 

He felt emptied of whatever good feelings he might have felt throughout his not so long existence, especially trust towards whichever human being he had the misfortune to encounter on his path from that day onwards.

His mouth, curved in that awkward smile of his, was beginning to ache; each step taken to walk towards Siwon, and his naturally annoying happy dimples, was a step in the direction of a full two weeks of excitement, tour of the Los Angeles area and parties. That was all Kyuhyun didn't feel the need to have in his life right at that exact moment, in which he just wanted to ask the entire world to shut the hell up and stop bothering him with all the vibrant distractions that were happy people and the unmistakable vibe they let flow around themselves.

Not to mention that Siwon had surely got the occasion to now introduce to Kyuhyun his long-time boyfriend, recently turned to fiancé after his own accepted proposal, which didn't thrill Kyuhyun at all.

Because, let's admit it, who would be the wise person to talk about marriage to a friend or a relative who just got burnt by the deception of being dumped? Perhaps Siwon was asking for a slow death, or that was what Kyuhyun had most likely thought all the way to California.

Anyways, Siwon was his best buddy, the only other male cousin he had in a family overflooded by a massive female presence, and that was basically why, when the man was still living in Korea, before moving abroad for studying purpose, they were inseparable. In truth Kyuhyun loved Siwon and the way his elder family member took great care of him, but sometimes his methods and way of being were...slightly too much.

He was perfect, almost too annoyingly perfect: for a start, he was handsome.

In all the splendor of his twenty-five years, he was tall, had lucid jet black short hair, magnetic dark eyes, confident grin, fit muscular body shape and a very efficient fashion sense. He managed to get a scholarship for one of the best universities abroad and moved to the US to finish studying for his master degree in Politics and International Relations. Supported in everything he did, he had recently gotten quite an excellent job as the Governor's assistant and that why he could finally gather rather good means to support himself and his boyfriend, whom he had met at university, dated for five years and kept with with him in every possible mean, too scared to lose him.

"Good to see you after so long, Kyuhyun!" Siwon spoke first, envelopping his cousin into a tight hug "You look great!" he radiantly smiled and patted his back twice, while all Kyuhyun could do was snorting, a quite nasty grimace to prove that in truth he looked anything but great.

"How was the trip?" Siwon kept on asking him as he helped the man with his luggage, probably not fully conscious of the fact that Kyuhyun was suffering from a terrible jetlag phase that was affecting his stomach in particular. Any journey he took actually ended up with him feeling nauseous. However he simply shrugged it off: "It was just too terribly long, as always" he mumbled.

"How come as always?" Siwon laughed quite loudly "You've never been to the US to visit me before!"

"Just saying..." Kyuhyun kept shrugging, mentally tired to keep on having this typical conversation about the flight duration, which most likely would have turned into a thorough examination of the now turning exceptionally good Californian weather, in opposition to the still chilly one that embraced the Korean peninsula. Kyuhyun hoped he would be spared at least this.

"Tell me, how are uncle and auntie doing? And Ahra?" Siwon asked, as he stopped to pay the parking fee at an automatic machine and then drifted towards the place his snow white Audi was.

"Father's as strict and autoritary as ever, he's still trying to get me to change faculty and enroll into the Law one. Mom keeps on feeding me whatever thing happens to pass by her stoves, probably she thinks I'm a kind of pig to breed and get fat for culinary purpose, but I'm no one to complain as long as I can eat as much as I want. And Ahra..." Kyuhyun stopped to take in a long sigh before resuming talking about his family "...she went to Europe on a study vacation with her boyfriend, I haven't heard much from her since the day she left. She keeps in touch mainly with our mother"

Kyuhyun sat in the car, his head turned to the window and eyes wandering on the sight passing by. He didn't feel good while talking about his older sister's boyfriend, not because he was against her relationship or what, his parents in particular loved the guy and Kyuhyun himself felt at ease around him. What bothered him were the upcoming, curious questions that Siwon would have more likely thrown at him and t