CHAPTER 9

Rights

Days come and go with a hectic schedule. Chanyeol had been busy with his work that all he could do when he left the office was drove back home and buried himself under the comfort of his plush pillows and cotton sheets—take note—no shower, no dinner. He’d resemble a freaking corpse if it wasn’t for his perfectly styled hair because of the circle under his eyes and how his lips seemed dry. There was a lot of pressure on his shoulders right now, given that he was often compared to his father on how he managed the company. He didn’t want to look incompetent so he kept on working hard in order to avoid that. Sadly, he sometimes forgot to take care of himself as well.

One of the things that kept him sane was the memories with Baekhyun, that night that they went around Seoul a week ago. Unknown to his princess, whenever Baekhyun wasn’t looking, Chanyeol was stealing pictures of him to treasure. And Chanyeol would never get tired of gazing at the most adorable person he had ever met.

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If it wasn’t for the fact that the CEO was a kind of man who would take his date to arcades, malls and coffee shops, Baekhyun would have mistaken Chanyeol as one hell of a scary boss. Truth to be told, one morning when he was about to go to the editorial department to talk to Kyungsoo, he managed to passed Luhan’s department on the same floor and found him yelling at his employees about sales and prints and everything that Baekhyun couldn’t understand.

Please, he was an illustrator, not a business major.

And that was the first time he had seen Chanyeol that angry. Well, except for the time when he spent the night in his pad, where the giant was so furious about him not being able to take care of himself and managing to make a mess in the bathroom with just a shower button. That was different though. That time, Chanyeol’s elfish ears were not as red as it was right now and there was no hot smoke coming out from his nose.

Maybe this was the side of the CEO he had yet to see. The furious, meticulous Park Chanyeol who wouldn’t blink an eye when he fired you from your incompetence. Baekhyun swallowed at the thought of that. No, no, no—he won’t let himself be on that situation when Chanyeol had no choice but to fire him. He would do great with his job, he promised. In fact, Sehun was so pleased when he saw his drafts.

Speaking of Sehun, the more time he spent with the author, the more Baekhyun saw him as a big baby. Whenever he visited him in his office, he and Sehun would talk about him and Luhan, and the author would sometimes asked the things Luhan would like and things like his allergies. Baekhyun was more than glad to give him tips since he could see how Sehun made Luhan happy.

Then, everynight he and Luhan would video chat to make up for the lost time. Nowadays, he rarely sees his best friend. He knew they were busy and loaded with things to do. But he didn’t expected them to be buried and stressed until he saw that scene with Chanyeol the other day. Although he didn’t see his friend back then, he was sure he was nipping on his lower lip just like how he always used to do when Mr. and Mrs. Lu scolded him.

“Baekhyuuun!” Luhan whined right after he stepped inside his pad. It was Saturday afternoon when the elder asked him if they could have some snacks at the younger’s place. Snacks, for the elder means bubble tea and chips, with movies playing in the background. Baekhyun was more than elated to know Luhan was available now so he said yes faster than a lightning and opted to cook for some homemade snacks aside from the chips Luhan would surely bring.

And yes, Luhan was carrying two plastic bags of chips with the one on left had a paper bag for two grand bubble teas. One flavored Taro for Luhan and one was Butterscotch for him. He chuckled because Luhan’s pretty face could be ugly when he made faces, and right now, he was like a man called by nature.

They settled on the carpeted floor in front of the LED television. Baekhyun’s fries were settled on a big bowl, tomato ketchup on a smaller one beside it, with lots of open chip wrappers surrounding it. Batman versus Superman was the movie on play, and Baekhyun frowned when he realized this but this was Luhan’s choice so he couldn’t complain.

They weren’t really watching the show, Baekhyun could barely understand the subtitles because Luhan kept on whining while he was stuffing fries in his mouth.

“Baekhyun, I’ve been there for a year, more than a year in fact, that was the first time Mr. Park got so angry at our department.” He kicked and set his back against the couch. “I really thought he was going to fire all of us that time!”

“Han, that was days ago, get over it, I heard your department had already done your part, right?”

Luhan nodded with a pout. “Marketing isn’t really one of the best departments to be in. We deal with the sales and stuff, the number of books to be printed according to the estimated sales which also depends on how popular the author was.”

“Why was Mr. Park so angry that time, if I may ask?” Baekhyun took fries and dipped it on the ketchup, before throwing it in his mouth, chewing slowly. He was looking at Luhan expectantly when the elder took a deep breath. “He was angry that our department didn’t convince the editor in chief about the ideal quantity of the books to be printed two weeks ago. The EIC was sure that the book won’t sell that much since it was only a try-out, a bromance. He said that people would not buy such thing. We printed only around 25 000 copies since he insisted when the marketing department wanted it to be 50 000.”

Baekhyun was still waiting when Luhan paused. The elder sighed and shook his head. “In just a week all copies were sold out and there were lots of complaints about the lack of copies and the time they still needed to wait to buy the newly printed books.”

Taking the butterscotch bubble tea on the coffee table, Baekhyun refreshed his throat before saying, “Isn’t that a good thing though? The books were sold out, and there’s a high demand, shouldn’t he be happy?”

The elder pursed and lips as he shook his head. “Mr. Park was mad that time because of the sales that we would lose the whole time we are still printing the new copies. He said that we didn’t do our job properly, letting the editor in chief decide something that wasn’t his job,” Luhan groaned and kicked again, almost hitting his toes on the foot of the coffee table. “He was right though, but he didn’t need to explode like that. We were embarrassed in front of the other departments.”

It was already seven in the evening when Luhan left. He thanked Baekhyun for a good time. The younger insisted to walked him outside the building and he did so, waving at Luhan after the other got into the bus. Baekhyun took a deep breath as he put his hands inside his yellow hoodie. He knew that it would be cold so he brought it with him.

“Who are you waving at?”

Baekhyun jumped away in shock, a hand over his chest when he whipped his head to the owner of the voice. Let’s set aside the fact that the CEO had always been gorgeous and hot as when he was on formal attire—the man scared the out of him.

“Sheesh! You startled me!” Baekhyun dramatically gasped, stepping back from the man to set some distance. Chanyeol’s face which was almost brushing his ear and his breath, tickling the shell of it might could have given him a good heart attack and he didn’t want to die right now.

The man simply raised a brow at him, looking like he didn’t care. He was exceptionally grumpy the past days, the younger observed. Baekhyun sighed and looked back outside the building. “That was Luhan, we just hanged out and watched some movie.” He purposely left the part where Luhan kept complaining about their CEO, who was actually in front of him right now. When Baekhyun took his attention back to Chanyeol, he found him taking a deep breath with closed eyes, index finger and thumb pressing the bridge of his nose.

“Where have you been Mr. Pa—Chanyeol,” Baekhyun scowled back when he saw Chanyeol’s glare, a fair warning for him not to continue the formal way of addressing him so Baekhyun drifted to the casual one instead. When would Chanyeol understand that Baekhyun would never get used to calling his employer by his first name?

Instead of answering, Chanyeol turned to the direction where the elevator was. He reached for Baekhyun’s hands and dragged him inside. Once the door closed, he took a deep breath first before looking at Baekhyun. “From the office of course, got some stuff left undone so I finished it.”

The younger knew that the schedule this week was hectic and that Chanyeol had been cranky lately. The fact that the elder wasn’t even doing weird things like barging in his privacy without notice or asking him to get a snack after working hours told him that the CEO was bombarded with responsibilities and that they were back to the real world where Baekhyun was just an employee and the other man was standing on the ground too high for him to reach.

Something inside him felt weird, now that he noticed it. Whenever he looked at his ugly phone, half expecting to receive a message from the giant, and whenever he jumped when someone knocked on his door, half expecting it to be the man next door to his office, he noticed that there was a change. And Baekhyun wasn’t sure if it was good or bad.

When Baekhyun noticed that the CEO was sweating profusely and that his lips looked dry and he somehow looked pale, he pushed his thoughts at the back of his mind and reached out to him unknowingly, to touch the man’s forehead only to gasped and take back his hand in shock.

“Chanyeol, you’re burning up!”

The CEO groaned and nodded. “Yeah, since this morning…”

Baekhyun’s face heated up. He didn’t know why but he got the courage to talked and forget that he was talking to his boss. “And you still went to the office in that state?! Are you ing out of your mind?”

Chanyeol scowled at him and hoarsely said, “I have work to do, I am the CEO of the company, princess, mere fever wouldn’t hinder me from doing my responsibility.”

“Yeah, but remember that before you became Park Chanyeol, the CEO, you were Park Chanyeol, the human first and the latter is someone capable of catching disease once he failed to take care of himself,” Baekhyun frowned at the elevator’s opened door when it reached his floor. He didn’t step outside until it closed and went on.

“What are you doing—why didn’t you—“

“I’m gonna make sure you won’t die tonight,” Baekhyun hissed.

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Baekhyun remembered the first time he got in Chanyeol’s pad, every place had its own moments. He even had to turn his gaze away from the direction to the bathroom, because it brought him embarrassing memories. Instead, he went straight to the kitchen, by the fridge, and looked for something in it. Chanyeol, on the other hand, loosened his ties and slumped on the couch, seeing everything in twos.

The younger had barely taken out the ingredients of the porridge he was about to make when his eyes fell on the CEO, who was one second away from falling on the ground.

He leaped from his spot but didn’t manage to catch Chanyeol in time. The CEO hit his head on his carpeted floor, but thankfully didn’t hurt himself. Baekhyun cursed under his breath as he pushed the man on the sofa set. He maneuvered his body to recline on the cushion, putting some throw pillows under his head. Baekhyun felt him shivering so he ransacked the house in order to get into the bedroom, taking the blanket from the guest room where he stayed before and the other room which he guessed was Chanyeol’s.

Truthfully, Baekhyun was in a panic mode. He didn’t know what to do first. But thankfully he managed to get things done. First he took some comfortable tee and sweatpants for Chanyeol. He tossed it on the coffee table near the unconscious male. Then he prepared cold water in a basin, and a clean cloth soaked in it.

Baekhyun internally apologized for what he was about to do, but he practically stripped his boss leaving him only in his boxers. He was trying hard not to ogle the perfectly toned body, not too muscular but definitely not skinny either. Squeezing the towel dry, he started wiping the sweat off of the man’s body before putting on the sweatpants and the tee.

It was hard, Chanyeol wasn’t the lightest person he knew and he was unconscious, making it difficult for Baekhyun to dress him. Upon seeing the comfort in Chanyeol’s face, he wrapped the man with two blankets. Then he proceeded to the kitchen, doing his best to make a porridge for the man he wasn’t supposed to care of.

It was eight-thirty in the evening when he finished. He got a paracetamol in Chanyeol’s medicine kit. To be honest, Baekhyun felt like superman flying here and there in the house. Albeit the fact that he also felt like a thief trying to search for vaults and gold in here, for he didn’t know where Chanyeol put his things.

He left the dishes undone in the sink when he took a bowl of the porridge he cooked to the living room. Chanyeol had turned to his side, clutching the blanket from the inside. Baekhyun took a deep breath and tossed the apron he was wearing on the other couch, wiped his forehead with the back of his right hand before crouching.

“Chanyeol…” he tried, voice soft yet commanding. “Chanyeol, wake up, you have to eat dinner, and drink medicine.”

When the CEO didn’t budge, Baekhyun scratched his head in frustration. Why am I doing this for you? You’re a grown up man for ’s sake and you can’t even take care of yourself! Of course he couldn’t say that to his boss. Baekhyun considered walking out to leave him alone, but a part of him didn’t want to. A part of him wanted to make sure that Chanyeol would drink his medicine, to make sure he’d be okay by tomorrow because somehow, he didn’t like looking at him like this. He didn’t like it when Chanyeol’s pushing himself too hard, to the point that he overlooked himself, to the point that he’d collapsed because of stress.

Baekhyun made up his mind and reached out, fingers sliding in the edges of the blanket around the elder’s face to cup his sweaty cheeks. His thumb brushed against his cheek bones, just underneath the dark circles in his eyes. “Chanyeol,” he tried again, voice louder, firmer, “Chanyeol wake up!” He shook his head gently, enough to take Chanyeol’s consciousness back. His eyes darted here and there, unsure and unfocused, but then he focused on Baekhyun and didn’t look away again.

“You’re burning up and you have to eat dinner for you to take a medicine. Get up okay, I made porridge, it’s not that good, but at least you’ll have something in your stomach.”

He helped him sit, with the blanket still wrapped around his shoulders and the rest of his body. Baekhyun would had laughed seeing the CEO on his bed hair if this was another situation, however, right now, instead of doing so he reached out and petted his hair.

Baekhyun gave him the bowl of porridge, but Chanyeol didn’t take it. Patience Baekhyun… Patience! You know by now that Chanyeol is a freaking mental when sick.

“Chanyeol you have to eat! What do you want me to do, feed you?” he sighed, exasperatedly. He meant it as an expression, but Chanyeol’s serious face had him cursing.

“You’re quite demanding when you’re not sick, but when you are, you’re ten times of a headache!” Baekhyun sat beside the CEO and scooped the porridge with the spoon. He blew it a few times before he hovered over the spoon on the elder’s lips. Chanyeol’s gaze was still on him when opened his mouth and Baekhyun fed him.

“Hah,” Baekhyun huffed. “You really are taking advantage of the situation.” He shook his head, but continued to spoon feed the man three years older than him. But surprisingly, Chanyeol finished the bowl, and he obediently took the pill of paracetamol with the younger helping him with drinking the water.

“You can go back to sleep, I’ll just clean up the kitchen.”

Unknown to Baekhyun, Chanyeol kept watching him from the living room as he washed the dishes. His eyes were glued to his back, and even when it was clear that he wanted to sleep, he kept his eyes open. The younger just had the work done when his phone rang. Wiping it with the clean, dry rug, Baekhyun fished it out from his front pocket, and took the call.

“Hello? Ah, Sehun? Why did you call?”

Chanyeol’s blank face darkened. Why was Sehun calling Baekhyun at such time? Moreover, when did they exchange numbers? This was not working days and even if it was, it was late at night. Was he doing this a lot the past week? The CEO found himself walking towards the kitchen, blanket already forgotten on the floor next to the sofa.

“Ah, okay, okay, so they have like lighter furs on their face that will look like tattoo patterns? Okay I’ll start drawing it later, yes so I can show it to you on Monday. Yes than—“

Before Baekhyun could even thank the man on the other line, he felt something gripped his wrist. He was shocked to find Chanyeol next to him, even more when the other took his phone from his grasp and threw it on the ground, breaking it to pieces.

“What have you done—“

“It’s Saturday and it’s almost nine, why are you calling Sehun?” Baekhyun met Chanyeol’s dark gaze with equal fury. “I called Sehun? You heard it a while ago how my phone sang its stupid ringtone. And what’s your problem? He was just reminding me of the details about the—“

“I don’t care!” Chanyeol bellowed, startling the man. “We’re not in the office and he’s not supposed to call you, it’s not working hours.”

Baekhyun’s brows creased, “Chanyeol you’re not making sense, why are you so damn angry? What makes you think that you have the right to forbid me from calling whomever I wanted to—”

Chanyeol noticed that they were next to the kitchen island so he took the opportunity to cage Baekhyun with his arms. His hands slammed on top of it, arms on both sides of the smaller male serving as the barricade so Baekhyun would not be able to escape him when he snapped, “It makes me jealous!”

Baekhyun’s tongue felt like cotton in his mouth, he couldn’t speak and he couldn’t move. He seemed to stop breathing either. With his body trapped between the counter and Chanyeol’s burning body, he could barely think of words to say. Chanyeol was breathing as if he ran a mile. Sweat trickling his forehead, down to his jaws. They held their gazes longer than intended, maybe because both of them were shocked and Chanyeol seemed to be gathering himself first.

It felt like years before Chanyeol moved, dropping his head on his shoulder. “It makes me jealous…” he repeated, much softer this time. His hands that were previously on the counter slowly crawled on his back, Baekhyun felt his arms wrapped around his waist, pulling him closer to the taller male.

“Can’t have you in the office for myself… both have work to do,” he mumbled in broken sentences. “You and Sehun… always together…”

Baekhyun wanted to scream and escape, he was deafened by the thunderous beats his heart was making right now, and he was sure that Chanyeol could feel it against his chest. “So… when we’re not working, I don’t like you hanging out with others…” the CEO confessed. “Those were precious times when I could spend my days with you…”

Baekhyun couldn’t find a single syllable to say, he had a lot to tell, make Chanyeol realized that he didn’t have the right to be jealous because they were not together—that his argument was invalid, but he was captivated by his eyes when Chanyeol pulled away and looked at him. Time seemed to stop, and all they could see was each other.

One moment, there was still a distance between them, but a second later Chanyeol threw out all of his hesitation and delved the younger’s lips with his. Their lips meld so perfectly, the CEO thought, in his haze, he remembered the first time he tasted Baekhyun’s lips, and how it was so hard for him to pull away and let Baekhyun go. Then the second time, when Baekhyun seemed to regret kissing him when it was obvious that the younger was feeling the same want and passion.

This time Chanyeol would not let him get away. He the younger’s lips with vigor, demanding answers. Baekhyun felt his tongue prodding the crack of his lips. He was still thinking that this was not right—if he gave in he would definitely regret this and Chanyeol would not leave him alone after this. But Chanyeol just had to call his name between kisses, and his knees turned to jelly.

Leaving all the rational thoughts aside, Baekhyun slid his arms around the man’s neck and jumped on him, Chanyeol catching him in his arms with his legs wrapped around the man’s waist. Baekhyun closed his eyes, let the CEO explored his mouth with his tongue. They kissed deep, hard, and they grabbed each other with desperate hands. Chanyeol dug his fingers on his hips, crawling up to his back while Baekhyun raked his fingers on the elder’s dark locks. Lips still attached, Chanyeol made his way to his bedroom, surprisingly without them falling in the process.

Chanyeol laid the smaller man on the mattress and latched their lips back, before tracing his jaws and neck with heated kisses as well. Baekhyun was left panting, lips moistened with his and Chanyeol’s spit, swollen and bruised. Chanyeol took a deep breath after he managed to left a mark on Baekhyun’s neck, reminding himself that he was not in good shape.

With his body weight trapping the man underneath him, Chanyeol fell asleep on top of the smaller male in mix of exhaustion and stress.

Baekhyun pinched the bridge of his nose, noting how his heart was doing summersaults.

“Chanyeol, you giant idiot…” he muttered under his breath, looking down at the man whose face was buried on the crook of his neck. His fingers moved on his own and he started raking the CEO’s hair with them, until he himself fell asleep.

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5.6.16