"Loving can hurt
Loving can hurt sometimes
But it's the only thing that I know"

Luhan sighed as he started to pack his back, tears escaping from his eyes. This is really not how he wanted to end his journey with the band, and this is, for sure, not how he wanted to say goodbye to the only person he's ever dared to love. It can hurt, indeed, it's tearing his heart apart, it feels so heavy, he's not quite sure he will make it alive. But he remembers that small voice ringing through his head, telling him, no matter what, he has to go and do whatever he feels is the best for him. So off he goes. He's rushing, he's going up and down in the room, trying to identify whatever little actually belongs to him, he knows he doesn't have too much time to prepare. He''s pulling drawers open, just to search through them and then push them closed,leaving a chaos inside. It's hard. Too hard. He starts to hum a song that he has found recently, and eventhough the language barrier had been a problem, he's managed to learn it, and he is clinging to that song for dear life.

"When it gets hard
You know it can get hard sometimes
It is the only thing that makes us feel alive" 

He keeps repeating these lines. He knows his love for him, and for himself will help him to get through whatever hell he is about to experience. Because, frankly, it still seems to be better out then in. He's walking around in the room again when his eyes focus on something very precious and very dear to his heart. It is a picture of them, together, back at that time, when he had, still, strongly believed, that they can hold on together. He takes the photo, walks over to Sehun's drawer and takes one of his tshirts he has always worn at home. He carefully wraps the photo in the tshirt, then puts it in his backpack,where he can make sure he can take care of it. He sighs heavily. He will keep this love, the memories and the smiles for himself, and this photo will remind him of that. Then he grabs a pen from the table, walks over to Sehun's bed and sits down,next to his nightstand. He opens it and carefully picks up the photo they didn't have time to frame yet. It's another picture of them, together. It is the most recent one,and you can already see the pain in Luhan's eyes, he somehow already knew that he will not last there for too long. But they still stare at eachother just as lovingly as they always have. He believes, they have something magical between them, where they are bestfriends and lovers at the same time. He is sure that he will never find someone like him, again, not even in a thousand years. So he carefully turns the photograph, places it on the sightstand and starts to write on the back of it. 

"We keep this love in a photograph
We made these memories for ourselves
Where our eyes are never closing
Hearts are never broken
Times forever frozen still

So you can keep me
Inside the pocket
Of your ripped jeans
Holdin' me closer
'Til our eyes meet
You won't ever be alone
Wait for me to come home."

He carefully looks over the quote he's written. It's from the song he's been humming to himself ever since he's heard it. Because, great songs find you when you need something to heal you and fill the cracks life has created. His handwriting is shaky, sure, and he knows, his loved one's English might not be the best either, but he just hopes that someone can help him to understand it, or he himself will make an effort to understand.

"Luhan"- he writes his name there, with small, shaky letters. He's not used to write this way, and on that emotional stage where he is at the moment - he still thinks, it's a miracle that he is breathing and functioning- this is the best he can do. He sighs for the tenth time and carefully places the photo back in the drawer of the nighstand. Then he stands up, put the pen back on the table. Picks it up again, walks to the door and draws a small heart just above the doorknob. How silly is that. How he's getting ready to leave everything behind, yet he's trying to find small, useless and cheesy ways to leave messages to Sehun, to remind him that eventhough he has failed to stay by his side, he loves him and adores him as much as ever. As much as someone can, possibly, ever love anyone. Honestly and desperately yet innocently, how he opens his heart, and if he had to, he would be ready to rip his heart out of his chest and give it to Sehun. He still doesn't know what makes him believe that the best choice is to leave this all behind. But he knows, if he doesn't escape in time, things might just get even worse. And he wants to be able to stand by his side once their fame has disappeared and they have wrinkles on their once beautiful faces. He wants to be able to be himself and still 
stand next to this man. And to be able to be himself, he has to leave now, before he does anything worse. He walks around in the room, drawing small hearts on different surfaces, picking up a marker pen on the way just to make sure that whatever he is doing can be as permanent as possible, before the company finds it out and gets rid of anything he could've touched. He goes as far as putting a chair on the table, carefully crawling pu there and drawing hearts on the ceiling. Because if there is one thing he can believe is that...

"Loving can heal
Loving can mend your soul
And it's the only thing that I know 
I swear it will get easier
Remember that with every piece of ya
And it's the only thing we take with us when we die"

He ends up writing the quote on the ceiling, not far from Sehuns bed, although he is almost sure that the younger will spend the next days in his bed. Crying. And he starts to cry as well. He carefully steps off the chair, the table, then takes the chair off  of the table,puttng it next to it on the ground. He's crying loudly, and he doesn't care, because he knows that noone is there to hear him. He is struggling to deal with the pain he is causing to the others and to himself, and he doesn't even want to think about how many people will be hurt when they realise that he has left the band. They were supposed to be perfect, they were supposed to be amazing and everlasting but it just couldn't work out, not the way they have treated them and made them feel like dying everyday. Even with his friends and his love on his side, it was unhumanly, and the bad moments have outweighted the good moments, long long time ago. And he was not the first to realise it, but probably won't be the last either. And he knows, that despite being the youngest, Sehun will understand, that he is hurting him, them, because he is hoping for a better future to come.

"And if you hurt me
That's OK, baby, only words bleed
Inside these pages you just hold me
And I won't ever let you go"

He wanders to the bathroom to get some tissues and clean his face. His eyes are red, so red that when he looks in the mirror he yelps, because he scares himself. He does not look like himself at all, he is so far from the happy, optimistic, talented and gorgeous boy he once had been. He feels ruined, ugly and useless. And this is not him. This shouldn't be him. He washes his face with cold water, hoping to calm down a bit, but the tears are flooding again as he remembers how much he hates himself, the person he has turned out to be. He starts to shout and cry even louder, crouching down on the bathroom's cold tiled floor. The cold floor feels nice. After a while he quiets down, the tears stop flooding and he starts to take deep breathes. He tells himself he will survive this, he tells himself he can do it. He stands up and washes his face again. He just hoped, that the others won't get back too soon. Because he couldn't do this if he had to see them. But he still has a faint hope that they will understand and that one day, they can see eachother again, without being hurt. And so, he takes a deep breath, walks back to the room and takes his bags and suitcases. He leaves the house before the others get back. His heart is aching, his whole body is in pain as he gets in the taxi and travels to the airport. It hurst so much that by the time he's checking in, his emotions slowly leave him and he just feels empty. And that might be the worst kind of pain. When something feels so terrible that suddenly it just makes you numb, then makes you empty.

***
- A few month later -
Luhan is wandering around in the city. He's slowly getting better. He can hardly ever talk to Sehun, since they obviously have forbidden them to get in contact with him, but being the silent rebel he is, he does manage to write to him sometimes. And sometimes, they communicate through fan messages. They have agreed on a bit unique and specific letter they would send to eachothers fanmail, so they can recognise it and reassure eachother that way. He knows it's hard for everyone, and the whole scandal is far form being over yet, but as he does more and more solo activities and actually do other things he enjoys too, his mood is becoming a bit better. He enjoys the Sun too, as it finally became slightly stronger. He loves sunny days. He walks past a small jewelry shop then stops in his track as he thinks he might have seen something in the window, and takes two steps back to look at it again. And he knows, what will be the perfect present. When Sehun was younger and missed his family, Luhan had gotten him a small necklace with a picture of Sehun's family in there so he could have felt like as if they had still been there with him. Now he's just seen something simular to that. It doesn't have a heart shape though, in fact it looks quiet manly as well with it's dark grey colour and the square that can be opened and can hold two tiny pictures. He walks in the store and buys two of it then leaves with a girn on his face. He'll have to be careful with this one, and make sure that Sehun does receive it. Once he gets home, he goes to find one of their favourite private couple picture, prints it out in  the smallest verion possibe then sits to his table and tries to fit the picture in both necklaces. It takes a good hour untill he can fit the photos nicely in both necklaces and he's grinning even more when he examines it, cause although it's kind of hand made, it doesn't look that bad. Then he grabs a marker pen, which he hopes will last, and to the other side where he could put another photo, he writes and "L" in one of the necklaces and an "S" in the other. He will send the one with his initial to Sehun and keep the other to himself.
He makes a photo of the two necklaces. And somehow, despite feeling broken for so long, he somehow feels a bit happy now. He takes a deep breath, stretching a bit then starts singing that oh so familiar song again. He would like to believe that his accent became better while singing this song as he has listened to it and sang it so many times. The next day he sends the letter including the small necklace straight to Sehuns private mailbox. They agreed to rarely use it cause although it is private, the company could still check it anytime. But he feels like that is the safest option now. He sends it first class, and they tell him it should arrive within a week. In the envelope, together with the necklace there is a small letter with yet another quote of the song, which Sehun has just started to call as their song.

"Oh you can fit me
Inside the necklace you got when you were 16
Next to your heartbeat
Where I should be
Keep it deep within your soul"

About two weeks later when he is secretly stalking - no, no, not stalking, just, you know, checking- the newest pictures about his ex bandmates, he has to stop scrolling down and take a breath, blink, breathe, blink and breathe again. Then he screams happyly, because there, on a photo where Sehun is just heading to practise, he can see,clearly see the necklace hanging from his neck. He feels like a school girl and he knows he is stupid, and he locks his phone screen as soon as his manager practically kicks his door open. When his manager shots him a questioning look, Luhan just comes up with an excuse about how he has been reading through some very lovely and encouraging comments and how he finally started to feel better now that his carrier is building again, and it's a bit lame, but his manager buys it, because he is glad to finally see Luhan a bit happy.

About a week later he notices the special envelope Sehun usually sends to him and he has to stop himself from screaming out in happiness, but he can't help the giddy feeling. He grabs it and heads to his room. He opens it, and beside the usual update about how Sehun has been and what is going on with the others, there are a few pictures they have made for him and printed out, there is one of their old selfies as well. Both Luhan and Sehun had been much younger on that picture, Luhan smiles and his eyes get teary when he sees it. Then as he turns it around, he sees a quote with Sehun's hardly readable, and probably rushed handwriting.

"When I'm away
I will remember how you kissed me
Under the lamppost
Back on 6th street
Hearing you whisper through the phone,
"Wait for me to come home." "

And he smiles and cries, because although he knows, Sehun has been listening to the song, it is the first time he has quoted it and he just found the most perfect part to answer. He grabs his necklace and kisses it. And he doesn't know, that at the same time tired after a long day, Sehun grabs his own necklace when he is out of their managers sight, and gently kisses it too.