XIII

When Eunhyuk had been a student, looking things up online had been a boring duty that often had caused him to fall asleep with his cheek pressed into the keyboard of his laptop (which had also blessed him with a weird pattern on his skin that always had been hard to explain).              
As he was scrolling through endless pages in this particular night however, he felt like a private detective with bad wage; with the lamp on his desk as the only source of light and piles of papers around him he fitted perfectly into his role. The only difference was that with every click his heartrate increased, especially when he thought he had found something which – sadly – wasn’t the case most of the time.

His single clue was the letter that Sora had found online. There was no name for that letter, at least nothing he knew, and so his only way to search was describing what Donghae had scribbled down on a few sheets by then. He had changed his description multiple times in hope for better chances, but it always ended in voiceless frustration. That night was the fifth time that he was trying his luck and he hoped that this time he wouldn’t get interrupted like all the times before. Sora couldn’t help because she chronically surfed incognito and had no idea what she had actually been searching for. Apart from that she was so busy these days that he could hardly talk with her. And she had other things to worry about with a baby on the way.

Sighing, he gave up comparing a list of every spoken language of the world with pictures of writing examples. The result: nothing looked alike.       
What did that mean? That it was a dead language like Latin, something that had been spoken five hundred years ago? Or had some space ship just dropped Donghae off and the papers around him held the language of another star? He snickered. This was actually a funny thought and he might would've laughed if he wasn’t that desperate.

He was just about to get up and get himself a coffee or something as a picture of his google picture search caught his attention. What he saw wasn’t the letter he was looking for, but it looked strangely familiar. Grabbing one of Donghae's papers and comparing them both, he let out a sound of relief – it was the same letter. Hastily he clicked on the link and with the help of some online dictionary he kept clicking rapidly until he found what he was searching for: every letter of Donghae's language was listed there, together with some Latin letters that helped to pronounce them. Eunhyuk felt like he had just won the lottery (that gifted a happy family life instead of just money) and grinned broadly. Scrolling back up again, he saw the name of the language; it was a word that he had never heard before so for once he didn’t think that he was just too dumb to put one and one together.

Thinking about how this would help to solve the mystery about Donghae, he searched for a definition of the word, internally celebrating his victory over the unknowingness. As the definition made sense in his brain, however, the smile fell from his face, was replaced by a frown at first that quickly turned into an expression of shock.

Eunhyuk kept staring at the screen for minutes, not seeing anything. All gear wheels in his brain were turning and cracking, steam almost puffing out of his ears until everything came to a sudden halt.  
This couldn’t be true. Never ever. Maybe Donghae had learned that language somewhere, maybe he had done it for fun because actually – so he hoped – no one would need a language like that. No one spoke it. It wasn’t even a dead one; it had never lived, if you could say it like that. Wasn’t that right? It was just made up by someone who obviously had had too much time and fantasy a couple hundred years ago.

His finger hovered over his mouse for a good couple of seconds before it punched down and closed the window. Eunhyuk would just stop thinking about what he had just read, he would use the night to let the information sink in and that's it. What he definitely wouldn’t do was giving the thought that Donghae was an even bigger mystery than he had thought he was more attention. Donghae wasn’t… that. He wasn’t like this. Never. No, no, no. No chance, nope. And Eunhyuk wouldn’t give in and actually think about the possibility.

***

"You look so tired, Hyukkie… Are you alright?" Donghae tilted his head to the side and reached out a hand to push some bangs out of the other's face.

'Tired' was an understatement. Eunhyuk hadn't slept a single second and he had needed a whole notepad to write down his thoughts and ideas. There were multiple theories that made sense to him; some didn’t at all but he had still written them down, just in case. A whole section of that notepad was filled with the things Donghae unconsciously did and now that the object of interest was right in front of him, Eunhyuk almost didn’t dare to blink, afraid to might miss something that proved one of his theories right or wrong. He didn’t let Donghae out of his eyes, his eyeballs burning already and making him look like a total creep, but he couldn’t care less.

"I'm fine", he mumbled and didn’t even believe himself. The brunet looked a bit worried and Eunhyuk thought that he had to do something to run a few tests. "My sister says the baby kicked her this morning", he stated with great lack of emotion.

"Really?" Donghae giggled and Eunhyuk's gaze left him for a second to notice that the potted plant a few meters away slightly moved.

Bingo.            
That plant was so far away that Donghae couldn’t reach it accidentally; he had to walk over there to touch it. Eunhyuk had made sure that all doors and windows were shut, they both hadn't moved – but there had been something waving the plant's leaves. He doubted that they could move on their own so the source of the movement had to be something else.

Eunhyuk thought for a while and remembered his notes; things around them only moved when Donghae had been happy. Maybe he had to make him happier.

"I think I'll visit her when the baby is there. Her daughter will surely look very cute because her husband is handsome."

More giggles – and the leaves moved again.

"I'm sure she will be cute. It's because your sister is very pretty."

"As cute as me when I was a newborn?" he wanted to know, his face straight.

Donghae blushed and this time some pieces of paper on top of the counter moved as well, so much that they fell down. Eunhyuk could feel a breeze on his face; it was gentle and nice. So Donghae somehow created wind when he was happy and when he got shy he did the same, but in a different way. The question was how he did that and why. Eunhyuk already knew the answer, but his brain refused to believe it, especially because there was nothing to see that could make wind.

He surrounded the counter to pick up the papers that had fallen down and also because he wanted to take a closer look at Donghae. The younger was wearing normal clothes and nothing about him looked special. Of course not, if he had looked any different Eunhyuk would've noticed it way earlier. He crouched down and with the papers in his hands he stopped halfway as he felt that warmth that surrounded Donghae and also lightened one of his theories. Donghae didn’t pay him much attention so he had a moment to try out something else.

With a step to the side the warmth disappeared. A step back and the warmth was back. Eunhyuk brought his hand up and like that he could feel the difference a bit clearer. It wasn’t immense heat so people usually wouldn’t notice that it was there but Eunhyuk had spent enough time with him to be aware. The warmth was only noticeable close to his back, but with his hand reached out he could also sense it a bit farther away; the picture in Eunhyuk's head got clearer, no matter how hard he fought against it. He just couldn’t accept the fact that he might be-

"What are you doing?"

Donghae looked over his shoulder and Eunhyuk was quick in pulling his hand back. "N-Nothing", he muttered and came back around the counter. There was a warm smile on Donghae's lips so Eunhyuk hoped that he hadn't noticed that he was watching his every move.

"Can I come around for teaching lessons today, Hyukkie?"

"When exactly?" he asked as casually as possible.

"Evening?"

"Donghae, you have to work-"

"But I'd rather be with you."

Eunhyuk bit the inside of his cheek. He knew that the brunet played a dangerous game and here he was once again, fighting with himself because he actually wanted the same as Donghae. This wasn’t about what they wanted, however.

"I would appreciate it if you went to work instead of coming to me", he said eventually and was looking anywhere but at him. "It's too dangerous-"

"Being with you is safer than being at the club", Donghae tried and truly, he had a point.

"Is your boss in town?"

Now he looked at him and he could see that he was hesitating. "I'm not… I'm not sure."

"You can't come to me when he could notice. I want you to be close to me, but not at all costs. If he finds out you'll be in so much trouble-"

"But-"

"-an