Chanyeol

I had changed in to some proper clothes once I’d left Baekhyun, readying myself for dinner. I didn’t really know what just had happened down there. I wondered if I had seemed strange. I probably had. Why did I have to do and say such stupid things? Baekhyun must most definitely think of me as such a weirdo now.

I stayed up in the room in the fear of having to face him before dinner, betting that he’d not come up here since he wouldn’t want to meet me because of my strangeness. But eventually, the clock turned and turned until dinnertime had arrived and I forced myself out of the room, trying not to seem too embarrassed. If Baekhyun knew I was embarrassed, he’d definitely be even more weirded out so it was better if I hid it.

When I got down to dinner, my eyes quickly found Baekhyun. He was talking to Hyolyn and Ken, Eunji nowhere in sight fortunately. I sauntered over to them and tried to casually sit down next to Baekhyun.

“Oh, hi.” Baekhyun said, smiling leisurely.

“Hello.” I said. And then they all went back to talking about whatever they had talked about before. Baekhyun seemed awfully relaxed, which made me a bit more uncertain if I’d ever even embarrassed myself or if it all had just been in my head.

Dinner passed without anything uncomfortable and I soon got in on their talk, feeling as if everything was great in the world again.

But then I remembered what would happen soon if me and Baekhyun didn’t make our escape. Baekhyun seemed unfazed by it, though, almost as if he’d forgotten all about our plan.

I nudged his knee with mine, hoping it would make him remember. He only looked at me with surprise, though, before continuing to talk. I nudged him again and this time he just ignored it.

“Hey, Baekhyun,” I said, changing tactics “How are you feeling? You look a little ill.”

“I’m fine.” Baekhyun said, smiling at me as if he honestly thought that I had been worried about him. Well, it wasn’t as if I could care less about him, I cared! Why would I try to make him make an excuse if I didn’t?

“You sure?” I asked “I think you better take some fresh air.” I turned to Ken and Hyolyn “Don’t you find him a bit pale?”

“Umh…” Hyolyn said “Maybe?”

“Let’s go and get some air.” I said, standing up and grabbing my jacket.

“I’m fine, okay?” Baekhyun said but then, suddenly, realization dawned on him and he quickly stood up. As if struck by luck, he actually stumbled a little as he stood up so suddenly, making it even more believable that he didn’t feel that well.

“Now that you mention it” he said “I do feel a little ill. Like I’m going to puke or something.”

“Let’s go outside.” I said, putting my arm around him so that he could pretend to be unsteady. He actually pulled it off pretty well, even I believed it for a while. We walked outside the hotel to the parking lot but when I let him go, he actually stumbled and I had to quickly grab hold of him again so that he wouldn’t fall. I let my arm loop with his, pulling him upright again, and this time not letting him go.

“Hey, are you actually feeling ill?” I asked, surprised by his stumbling feet.

“No,” Baekhyun said “I just had a drink earlier and since my balance sometimes goes first when I drink, my legs just doesn’t seem to listen to me.”

“Oh.” I said “Do you want to sit down somewhere?” Baekhyun nodded and I led him to a grassy patch that was a bit further away from the entrance. There, we sat down behind a tree so that if somebody came out to look for us, they wouldn’t see us.

“Thanks.” Baekhyun said as we’d both safely seated our self on the soft grass. The sun was almost set as we gazed out over the deserted parking lot. Except for a few parked cars nearby, there was no signs of civilization and you could almost pretend that there weren’t any other people around for miles. The noises from inside the hotel weren’t penetrating outside so it was completely silent except for the noises of the woods towering up behind us. A few crickets were waking up and making music and we sat in silence. It wasn’t really uncomfortable to be silent, but I still felt like we should say something. But before I got the chance, Baekhyun spoke.

“You know…” he said, his voice a bit hushed, as if he didn’t want to disturb the silence “it was actually very nice of you to think of me today.”

“It’s nothing.” I said, smiling gently as he looked at me with uncertain eyes “I just thought that you didn’t want my hands all over you again, like this morning, I mean.”

“Right.” Baekhyun said, he was quiet for a while and I could see how his thoughts spun around inside his brain “Actually,” he said, after a while. He seemed hesitant to continue so I looked at him encouragingly and he began speaking again “I didn’t really mind that you touched me this morning.”

My eyes widened at his candor and I felt kind of bad for having lied to him and pretended to not really know what I had done. He was being all honest next to me, and here I sat, a big lie weighing me down. He basically forced me to confess without really knowing it.

“If I am being honest,” I said “I… actually knew what I was doing this morning.” This time, it was his eyes that widened “I was kind of asleep, but-“ who was I kidding? I was wide awake “No, that’s a lie again. I was completely awake and just blamed my movements on sleep.”

Baekhyun looked at me, mouth hanging slightly open. It would have been funny if my confession hadn’t been so serious and the vibe between us had been easier. Right now, it felt like the whole world weighed down on me. Did he think I was disgusting? Did he hate me now?

“Y-you…” Baekhyun said, trailing off, not finishing the sentence “Why?” he didn’t sound offended, just completely shocked.

“I don’t really know.” I answered him truthfully “I kind of… just wanted to do it, I guess? I don’t know, I’m as confused about this as you must be.” He was silent again, staring at me with puzzled eyes. I wondered what he was thinking. He didn’t seem disgusted by me, so I guess he wasn’t thinking that at least.

“You wanted to?” He asked, still sounding incredibly confused. “Why?”

“Umh…” I said, looking away from him and off to the almost completely gone sun “I… I just wanted to. I can’t explain it really.”

There was silence again, this time, it lasted for at least a minute and I had began to wonder if I should leave and go and hide somewhere. Maybe I should leave the bonding all together? I was sure he didn’t want to have some confused and touchy guy sleeping next to him for the next couple of days.

“I didn’t really mind.” Baekhyun repeated, breaking through my thoughts of negativity. I turned back to him slowly, locking my eyes with his “Actually,” he said, looking away from my eyes in embarrassment “I kind of… liked it.” It took me a moment to register. He… liked it? He liked being touched by me?

“You did?” I asked, not really believing my own ears. He only nodded, carefully glancing back up at me.

“I’m sure it’s just because I haven’t had much human touch for a while now!” He said quickly “I mean, before the bonding I had been off of girls for a while, not wanting to have any of them interfering with my future match and all…”

“Yeah!” I said “I’m sure that must have been why I wanted to touch you, also. Before the bonding, I hadn’t slept with a woman in a week or so.”

“A week?” Baekhyun asked and when I nodded he burst out laughing.

“What?” I asked, leaning a bit closer without even thinking about it.

“God, you really are a player.” He said between laughs “I hadn’t been together with a girl for at least a year before this!”

“That long?” I asked, actually pretty surprised by this fact “How is that possible? For someone as gorgeous as you that would be…” I realized too late that I had said something I shouldn’t have “…impossible.” I finished as Baekhyun stared up at me, stars being mirrored in his eyes from the sky above.

Baekhyun

Gorgeous? Chanyeol thought I was… gorgeous?

“It’s true, though.” I said, trying to ignore what he’d said “I just didn’t want the person who I’d spend the rest of my days with imagining that I had someone else waiting for me back home.”

“I don’t have anyone like that.” Chanyeol said, his breath falling on my face “I cut all those ties before coming here, I’m really not a player, okay?” It was as if he were about to say more but stopped himself before he blurted out something else that would make both of us feel embarrassed.

“I believe you.” I said, staring up in to his face. My voice came out almost as a whisper, my last word being more of a breath than an actual sound. There was something about him that made me lose my voice. We were so close, much closer than I’d thought we’d been and I had no idea how that had happened. I could feel my heart beat fast in my chest and as I stared in to Chanyeol’s eyes, I could feel both of us leaning closer together. His hand came up to my cheek, feather light and it was as if an invisible force slowly pushed our faces closer. It felt so natural when my lips slightly parted, as if there was nothing strange about this but instead it being the most organic and normal thing in the whole wide world.

I could feel Chanyeol’s breath mingle with mine and my heart jumped inside my chest as our noses carefully clashed. Chanyeol’s hand on my cheek slowly tilted my face slightly and just as I closed my eyes, ready for whatever was to come, a white flash hit our faces.

I opened my eyes in surprise as yet another flash went off, and after it a series of a dozen more at an incredible speed. I turned in surprise to find several people peeking out from behind a car not far from us. At first I was thinking what a strange thing for them to do, but then I realized that they were all holding cameras in their hands, the light from earlier being their flashes blinding us. A row of more flashes went off and Chanyeol quickly pulled me up to my feet, putting me behind him as the photographers continued to harass us with their cameras. I was too shocked by this sudden change that I couldn’t do anything besides follow his lead.

“Park Chanyeol!” One of them cried out “Is it true that your father isn’t pleased by your preference?” Chanyeol pushed me forward, trying his best to shield me as the photographers followed us as we tried to get back to the safety of our hotel. I let him push me along, completely dumb-struck by the whole thing. I had never before been the focus of paparazzi and I couldn’t piece together why anybody would be interested in what me and Chanyeol did. Fortunately for the both of us, my legs worked better now than they had earlier, so that was something, I guess?

“Have you always known you were into guys?” Another voice called as Chanyeol pushed me towards the hotel “Have you and Mr. Byun done more than kissing? Is it true that the two of you already share a bed?” questions after questions spluttered out of their mouths like a hail storm and I believed for a moment that as soon as we reached the hotel doors, we’d be fine. I was mistaken. The paparazzi followed us inside the lobby and by now, Chanyeol had grabbed hold of my hand and basically ran with me up the stairs and in to our room, the paparazzi yelling at us and flashes having followed us all the way to our door.

Safely in our hotel room, Chanyeol locked the door quickly and for a while, all we could do was listen to their endless questions outside our door, them gradually becoming more private than the one before.   

“When is the wedding? Have you been going much further than kissing? Who tops? Do you like with guys more than girls, Mr. Park?”

After a while, the hotel guards had seemed to react and was getting the paparazzi away from our door and, hopefully, out of the hotel. I was really shaken up by the whole thing, seating myself on the bed in pure shock as Chanyeol made some frantic calls to people I didn’t know.

“I don’t know how they knew where we were!” He seemed to say, obviously also shaken up by the whole thing “But you can fix this, right? You always can for my father.” There was silence and the other person on the line were saying something “I don’t know! I didn’t see any names, I guess they were freelancers?” there was more silence and then Chanyeol said good bye and instantly called up someone else. He told them what had happened and then there was silence as he listened. I could hear a small voice on the other side of the phone if I listened really carefully.

“What kind?” Chanyeol asked, probably repeating the question he’d gotten over the phone, and after another silence, he continued speaking “No! Of course not! Who do you think I am? I don’t just undress people, or myself for that matter, by a freaking parking lot where anybody could walk by!” the voice on the other side became louder before Chanyeol answered “We weren’t even doing anything. We just… I don’t know… sat close? Okay, a little more than that but it wasn’t as if we-“ he broke off as he saw me looking at him “I need to go.” He said to the person on the line and hung up without waiting for an answer.

“Hey,” he said, suddenly sounding much gentler “Are you okay?” He went down on his knees in front of me, looking worried as our faces leveled.

“Mhm!” I said, with a bit too much energy for it to sound truthful “Totally! I’m totally fine!”

“I’m not.” He said “And I’m guessing I’ve had more experience with paparazzi than you? It’s okay not to be fine.”

A small sob built up inside of me, surprising me, and when Chanyeol put his hand on my knee, it all broke out of me and I started crying instantly. I threw my arms around his neck without even thinking about not doing anything reckless, needing to have someone to hold on to so that I didn’t lose all control I had.

“Shh…” he hushed, my back with his hand “I will take care of it, okay? I’ve called both my dad’s manager and also one of our family friends in the publishing industry, they know how to take care of these kinds of things. Everything will be okay.”

I didn’t say anything. The shock of it all being too much. I only cried, my tears and sobs slipping out of me without me having any say in it. Chanyeol just continued my back gently, as if I was a little child he needed to comfort.

We stayed like that for a while, him letting me just cry it all out without saying anything about it. He simply stayed put, as a strong rock that I could depend on.

When I felt like I’d cried for an eternity, I finally managed to calm down. Chanyeol didn’t let me go, though. He just stayed put until I would do anything that would indicate me not wanting to hug him anymore. I didn’t really feel ready to let go, though, so I continued to hold on to him, burying my face in the nook of his neck. It wasn’t anything ual about it, it was truly just comfort and it felt safe in a way I hadn’t experienced before.

“That was really scary.” I said, my voice sounding all rusty after all the sobbing.

“I know.” Chanyeol said “I’ve always hated it.” There was a small silence before I spoke again.

“Do this happen often to you?” I asked, a bit worried.

“No, not really.” He said “It happens sometimes when I’m with my dad, and it has happened to me myself only once when I had been out drinking with a group of friends.”

“That’s awful.” I said and, with a collected force of strength, I leaned away from him and sat up by myself on the bed. “Why did they do this!? It makes no sense to me!”

“Well,” Chanyeol said, looking incredibly apologetic even though he had nothing to apologize for “you know that people have been talking about us ever since that short clip from the matching, right?” I nodded, I had thought it strange then but my whole twitter had blown up for that day “Well, it seems like the reporters didn’t just want a one-time scoop.”

“So… they will be taking more photos of us?” I asked, feeling a bit intimidated “Just because your dad is famous?”

“Probably, yes.” He said with regret “And I think it’s only partly because of my dad’s fame. The whole thing originated from the fame alright, but I don’t know. Reporters and Paparazzi tend to start chasing scandals and if this isn’t a scandal to them, then I don’t know what is. It seems they must have figured out that my dad is against it, too. Did you hear one of them ask about it?” I nodded, remembering “That only brings more attention to it. If they smell anything that could start some kind of drama, they will circle it like moths circle the light.”

“But that’s absurd!” I exclaimed “Isn’t this illegal!?”

“I hope so.” Chanyeol said “Technically it’s not, but I hope my dad’s assistant finds something about this that is illegal so that those photos won’t be published.”

Published… I hadn’t even thought about that yet. Everybody seeing me and Chanyeol… like that. Suddenly the realization of what we had been about to do hit me and the paparazzi thing seemed to get a back seat for a while as my mind flooded with our almost-kiss.

How could I have allowed myself to act like I had? I hadn’t even tried not to position myself for a kiss. I had just moved closer, letting him move my head, letting myself be swept away by the moment! It didn’t matter that I had wanted to kiss him, because I had, I had wanted that the whole day. I just couldn’t kiss him! I wasn’t going to spend the rest of my days with him, it was that simple. And that was because… because what? All reason seemed to have left me and I couldn’t figure out anything that told me that me and Chanyeol couldn’t be together. Not even our previous promise to each other to not be intimate seemed relevant. He’d even told me that he had purposely touched me this morning, and I had told him that I had liked it. So what was stopping us?

I looked up at him then and I saw it on his face too. The same thoughts I had circling inside my head was making just as much ruckus inside his.

“Umh…” he said “Earlier, before the paparazzi came…”

“Don’t worry about it!” I hurriedly said “It was just some kind of… in the moment thing!”

“Yeah…” Chanyeol mumbled, his eyes gliding off me in embarrassment. I couldn’t really look at him either, blushing too much for my own good. “It’s just that… everybody will think we… you know… if the pictures are published, I mean.” I hadn’t thought about that. Because even though we hadn’t kissed, it would definitely look like we had.

Chanyeol’s phone began ringing and he excused himself and picked it up, standing up and starting to walk around the room as he spoke to whoever was on the other side of the line. I didn’t really listen but I could hear fragments of it through my own muddled thoughts.

“Tomorrow? – But – Every newspaper? – No” My mind were flying back to our almost kiss, how Chanyeol’s breath had mingled with mine, how gentle he had seemed, how his eyes had been so dark and filled with something undetectable, something that I so much wanted to explore. His hand on my cheek, guiding me gently and me letting myself get swept away. I shook my head and as I came back to our room, Chanyeol said good bye one the phone.

“Well,” he said “the good news is that my dad’s manager have gotten in contact with the newspapers before the paparazzi did.”

“And the bad?” I asked, knowing that wasn’t all there was to say about it.

“The bad is that as soon as they heard about it, they refused to not publish any pictures that reached them.” Chanyeol said “We just have to hope that someone finds something illegal about this, otherwise, I’m afraid we will be seen all over the country.”

Chanyeol

This was the worst thing ever. I couldn’t help hating my dad for it. If it hadn’t been for him probably saying something negative about me and Baekhyun to people, the paparazzi wouldn’t even be interested in us and instead, we would have probably still been down by the parking lot, having actually kissed.

The thought of it made me all bubbly inside and I didn’t know what to think about that. It didn’t seem like Baekhyun had a positive look on it from the way he’d so quickly explained it away as an in-the-moment thing. I had been about to ask him if he’d like to kiss me for real but he’d just quickly made a U-turn and had made me think. Maybe it had just been an in-the-moment thing for him and maybe it would never be anything else. It was all very confusing and I tried to drop it off my mind, but I couldn’t. My thoughts just continued to spin and spin without me having any say in it.

We decided to go to bed and we both turned so that we laid back to back.

“Goodnight.” Baekhyun said and I called back to him the same, though I couldn’t fall asleep. I laid awake, feeling the warmth of his body seep over to me. The longer I laid there, the loner I felt like turning over to him and pull him towards me like I had this morning, even completing that kiss I had initiated.

“Chanyeol?” It was Baekhyun, apparently not having fallen asleep either, which surprised me. I could feel him turning over to look at me so I did the same, not wanting to have him talking to my back.

“Yeah?” I asked. In the dark it was hard to tell what kind of expression Baekhyun had so I tried to go off what his voice sounded like instead. We were laying rather far apart which didn’t seem right to me anymore. I didn’t move, though, in the fear of it freaking Baekhyun out.

“What if the paparazzis get in to our room when we’re sleeping…” he said, sounding spooked.

“I don’t think they’d do anything like that.” I tried to ensure him “Even they have their limits.”

“I guess you’re right…” He said, though he still didn’t seem convinced. “I know I’m being silly but I just feel like we’re being watched and that scares me.”

“I know how you feel.” I said “I don’t know if it makes you feel better or not, but when I was younger I used to think the same thing and for me, it helped to remember that I wasn’t alone. Back then, I always went to my dad when I felt scared of those almost constant cameras.”

“What did your dad do?” Baekhyun asked, his voice so gentle it was almost hard to hear what he was saying.

“Well,” I said “he hugged me and told me that everything was going to be okay, I guess.”

“And you felt better after that?” Baekhyun asked.

“I did.” I answered “Sometimes, I’d sit with him until I fell asleep, just needing to be close to someone else. He’d hold me until I was fast asleep and then put me to bed, knowing that I’d fallen asleep knowing I was protected.”

There was a silence after that and I felt a bit more relaxed after having talked to Baekhyun and finally, my eyes began to feel a little heavy. I was about to fall asleep when Baekhyun finally spoke again.

“Can you…” he began, then hesitated, and then spoke again “hold me like you used to be when you were younger?” he asked and I felt my heart stopping at his words.

“You don’t need to!” Baekhyun hurriedly said “But I just… I wanted to see if it would help me fall asleep.”

Without saying anything, I help my arm up for him, indicating that he should scoot over to me so that I could lay my arm around him. Hesitantly, he came closer and when he was close enough, I enclosed him in my embrace, pushing myself so that the last space between us were eliminated. We’d assumed the same position which we’d had this morning, only now, we were both aware that it was something we’d both chosen to do.

I felt Baekhyun lay his arm around my waist and a current of electricity passed through my body at his touch. I could barely believe that this was even happening and tried my hardest not to overreact. We were just casually snuggling, not even that, I was just trying to make himself feel safe again after something that would shake up most anyone. This was all about being able to fall asleep, but my heart still couldn’t stop its rapid speed.

Baekhyun sighed, his breath puffing out at my neck and I shivered. I closed my eyes and tried my hardest to calm down. After a while, I felt Baekhyun’s breaths come down softer and I realized he’d fallen asleep.

I laid awake for a while longer, marveling at the simple idea that I could make someone feel so much less afraid by simply holding them. It was a bit surreal to think that I was letting a guy sleep pressed up close against my body, voluntarily. It even making me feel happy!

I could feel Baekhyun breath against me, feel how his body moved as it filled up with air. His hair was touching my throat and it felt so soft. I almost reached out to touch it, but I stopped myself at the last second. That would be too much of a gesture. This was grand enough but it somehow became oh so much more intimate if I were to touch his hair. I couldn’t put my finger on why, but it felt so tender in a way.

I didn’t even know if other guys liked tenderness, it hit me. I knew girls wanted you to be soft and nice with them, but did guys want the same? Myself, I didn’t really care. Sure, it’s always nice to have some softness but I couldn’t really figure out if  that was just me or if all guys wanted that. There must be some out there who liked their partner to be rougher, just in general. More bulkily built body, worn hands, a face which you could tell had seen some things. Did Baekhyun fantasies about such guys? It made me a bit self-conscious. All this time I had been walking around, kind of freaking out about the fact that I actually wanted to get closer to a guy instead of a girl, when there were more important things to freak out about.

What if Baekhyun’s disgust at the matching hadn’t really been because  I was a guy, only because I was a more feminine guy than he’d wanted? What if he’d faked liking girls just so that he wouldn’t have to break the news to me and tell me that I wasn’t manly enough?

I fell asleep to these worried thoughts and in my dreams, I saw man after man, all much more rough than I would ever be, walk past me and off to meet up with Baekhyun at the parking lot where we’d been earlier this evening. For them, there were no paparazzi to interrupt them and once the manlier men came back from the parking lot, they looked worn out, their lips all plump.  I could distinctively tell how they smelled of Baekhyun, my nose having stored his smell by memory for me. I was embarrassed by that fact the day after, me not having realized how well my brain had started to memorize everything about him. 




A/N

Hello guys! It's been so long, I know! (Almost a month!) But I have probably had the most busy month in my life! I will in two weeks finally get out of this stressfull scedule and I can't wait! 

I hope this chapter made up for my abscense! It was so much fun writing this chapter and I can't wait until I get time to start writing the next~ (Though I have to warn you right now, you will probably have to wait for the next chapter for a while! Maybe not as long as you'd have to wait for this chapter but it will take time, though, since I am so busy with school and life in general! )

I hope you all are well and that you aren't as stressed as me! Until next time, bye!!