- what is love (an epilogue) -

What was "love" anyway?
When puberty had hit him, Minseok had constantly wondered about that question. As the child he had been, he had constantly tried to imagine his future life. Songs and movies and TV commercials had all tried to convince him that "love" would have to be part of it but he had trouble understanding what the word even really meant. He loved his family and baseball and watching cartoons on Sunday morning and grilled beef, but even as a child he had understood that those forms of "love" were not quite what cheesy lyrics meant. His love for his neighbour's cat was not what the medieval poets talked about in the poems Minseok had to read in school.
He tried to understand it but the more he thought about it, the more convinced he was that either "love" didn't exist or he was incapable of feeling it. Maybe it was hereditary because he knew that there was no actual love between his parents. His parents had found each other based on physical preferences, had then got along well enough for as long as they still had hope for their children, and had then slowly started to dislike each when their sons had failed them.

For the longest time, Minseok didn't think that he could love. Just like how his father couldn't love his wife, Minseok couldn't love any of the girls he had tried to date. No matter how much he liked her as a friend, he had never loved Hari. And he couldn't even remember the names of some of the girls he had been with because he had been awful enough to only think of them as extras to fill the gap in his heart.
And then, as he slowly began to understand himself a little better, he figured that maybe he could love but wasn't supposed to. Something in him was crooked and it scared him, so he never let himself go.
In retrospect, it felt a little as if he had built a fence around himself and whenever he started to date another girl, he did it by looking at her through a hole in it. He really couldn't blame them whenever they told him that they could not go on like this.
"What are you even scared of?" Hari had often asked him but he had never answered her question.
Because the truth was that for the longest time he had been scared of having to admit that he could only love the wrong kind of person.

"I swear they're not always like that," Chanyeol said as he kicked a stray sock under his bed and hurriedly closed the open closet. The sleeve of a white shirt got stuck between the frame and the door but Chanyeol simply left it that way as he rubbed his eyes under his big glasses. He looked completely worn out. At one point he had rushed to the bathroom to take out his contact lenses and had come back to his mother showing Minseok childhood pictures of him.
"Look at that little cutie," his mother had said happily. "His face was round like the moon."
"When he ran, the ground shook," his father had barked out.
"You should really be careful," his sister had whispered while leaning in so close to Minseok that he could smell her shampoo. "It's not just because he grew taller that he lost weight. I heard that you make him work out so I'm sure you understand that he could easily get fat again. Just tell him that you'll dump him if he does."
The whole situation just was odd and Minseok couldn't quite shake the feeling that it didn't seem real as he sat down on the chair in front of Chanyeol's crowded desk. He could barely see its wooden surface because it was covered in loose sheet music and open notebooks and an assortment of pencils. It felt like being stuck in a daydream and he had to touch the smooth paper of a math book to understand that it really was there.
When Chanyeol and his sister had come up with a battle plan to slowly persuade their parents a few weeks earlier, he had never really expected this day to come. He thought it was nothing but a fantasy. Meeting Chanyeol's sister had been hard enough and he knew from his own family that siblings tended to be more understanding. Siblings didn't have the same expectations as parents. After all, siblings had not spent a great chunk of their best years to raise someone who then turned out to be a fungus instead of a flower.
But here he was now. Chanyeol's mother had constantly asked him whether he wanted anything else to eat and Chanyeol's father had talked to him the way the fathers of some of his old teammates had. They had treated him like a guest despite knowing who he really was. Despite knowing what he was.
"I like them," Minseok said as looked from the desk to the shelf with various books and CDs and other random items next to it. A small dusty globe stood next to an old family portrait and a jar with coins and an encyclopedia of bugs that looked as if it hadn't been moved since the moment it had been placed there.
Chanyeol let himself flop down on his bed and sighed, "I bet you do. You're not the one they were trying to embarrass." He idly picked up his acoustic guitar that lay sprawled across his pillow and began to tune it while leaning against the wall in an angle that looked as though it would definitely hurt his neck after a while.
Minseok quietly chuckled and as he got used to being in the room, he slowly let his gaze wander around. Being in Chanyeol's room was like stealing a glance at the inside of his mind. The posters on the walls and the colour of the curtains and the electric guitar in its case in the corner and the school blazer on a hanger at the wall, everything about the room was completely ordinary and completely Chanyeol. It smelled like him. It looked like him. It was filled by the sound of him quietly playing the guitar. And as he looked at Chanyeol's messy handwriting in an open science exercise book he unwillingly smiled.
"So, sunbae," Chanyeol suddenly said and Minseok looked up. "Let's do that thing you always do with Minkyung. The secret thing."
Minseok blinked and then frowned and asked, "If I confess something you have to confess something, too?"
"Yeah," Chanyeol nodded as he stared at the ceiling above him and continued to play his idle melody.
"You first," Minseok mechanically said and tried to think of something he hadn't said before. Even with Minkyung he always got a little nervous when she tried to confess something because he knew that he would not only have to deal with her but also have to find something to say himself. He unwillingly straightened his back and put his hands on his knees.
"So," Chanyeol began but then didn't immediately continue. Only his melody filled the space between them. "So," he said again. "Before I can tell you anything, I think you should come closer because I don't want to yell."
Minseok blew air through his nose in quiet laughter. The room was not big so they could have easily whispered and still understood each other perfectly. But rather than to comment on that, he stood up, took the two steps towards the bed and sat down at its edge, next to where Chanyeol's legs dangled off it.
"Okay," Chanyeol nodded when Minseok looked around to him. "So, have I told you about how I tried to join the marching band in school before?" he asked and continued to play the same melody in a loop. Rather than to look at Minseok, he had a spaced out expression.
Minseok had a feeling that this was not exactly what he had meant to talk about. It reminded him of every time he had made up something around Minkyung, just so that he could claim to have confessed anything at all.
"Yeah, so, long story short, I wanted to play the trumpet but they wouldn't let me," Chanyeol continued in a strange tone. "I was really mad about that for maybe two weeks. But well, in the end I got over it. Their uniforms look stupid."
Minseok laughed as he tried to remember what the marching band had looked like. It had often appeared during games to cheer his team on and had always felt a little over the top. As the brass instruments glimmed in the sun, the baseball players got covered in dust and sweat while the crowd cheered.
It was odd how he immediately felt thrown back. The shouting and clapping and the loud music and the heat of the summer, they all washed over him. And for the first time in forever it didn't feel bad.
"I met Yang Taekgi the other day," he unwillingly said and then bit his tongue. Yang Taekgi was one of the parts of his past that probably needed explanation. Taekgi had been his best friends for years but when Minseok had left baseball behind, Taekgi had disappeared with it. Taekgi had shown him how fickle friendship could be.
"Hm?" Chanyeol asked while staring at the ceiling. "The pitcher?"
"Yeah," Minseok nodded and looked down at his feet. "He has a goatee now. Made him look funny."
"Hah," Chanyeol said with a grin and changed the melody he was playing to something more upbeat.
"Yeah," Minseok smiled and then pressed his lips together. "I didn't think I'd ever talk to him again after I quit the team."
Chanyeol finally looked over to him with a sad expression but didn't ask any questions. With everything that had happened around him lately, he probably knew best how easily some decisions could change everything.
When none of them said another word, Minseok eventually leaned back until his head was level with Chanyeol's elbow. As he looked up he noticed that there was a poster with the solar system stuck to the ceiling.
"It glows in the dark," Chanyeol noted when he noticed Minseok looking. "And it's been there for like ten years."
Minseok smiled and Chanyeol played a melody that sounded oddly ethereal, like a journey in space.
"So, sunbae," Chanyeol said. "I'm sure you're aware that that was a warm up. If I confess something real now, you'll have to confess something real, too."
Minseok choked out a laugh and asked, "The marching band story wasn't real?"
"Oh, that was sadly very real," Chanyeol shrugged. "But not so real that I would threaten you to tell me a secret in return. Me trying to join the marching band is public information and I actually would have expected you to know that already." When Minseok was about to ask how he could have possibly known it, Chanyeol added, "I mean, I like Minkyung and everything but sometimes I feel like I'm being spied on."
"Mh," Minseok said because he could not really deny that his sister did inform him about a lot of things that happened during her days at school. In his family she had always been the one he was closest to, but he had never been as involved in her everyday life as he was now.
"You first then," Minseok then said when he realized that Chanyeol seemed to wait for an answer.
"Right," Chanyeol said and cleared his throat. "So," he continued but then left it at that again. After the marching band and Yang Taekgi, Minseok had felt almost relaxed but as he now lay on his back and looked at the rings of saturn above him while Chanyeol hesitated to say what he wanted to say, his prior nervousness crept up to him again.
"You know," Chanyeol began and for a second Minseok had the impulse to slap his side to make him spit it out. As if he had sensed that, Chanyeol said, "My sister thought you were going to die of a heart attack tonight." He laughed but something about it sounded forced so that Minseok unwillingly looked up although he could barely see Chanyeol's face from his position.
"I know that I took a huge gamble and that I really shouldn't have done that to you," Chanyeol continued and sounded solemn. His melody also sounded weirdly strained. Minseok meant to protest because he knew himself well enough to know that, if not for the fact that he had been tricked into it, he wouldn't have come. But then Chanyeol already said, "To be honest, I didn't know if everything would really work out in my favour. I just kind of hoped that my parents would be too surprised to say anything bad. You know, catch them in the momentum and then persuade them that me dating you is really not something to be concerned about. And I mean, it did work, right?" He clearly tried to make it sound light but then his voice became lower when he muttered, "But Yura-noona was right. It wasn't fair towards you, so I should really apologize."
Again, Minseok meant to say something but wasn't sure what. Logically speaking, it probably hadn't been fair. But he had done the same when he had stood by as his own brother had made Chanyeol uncomfortable by bringing up their parents. These moments would never end. Every time they told someone new about them, there was a chance that that someone would not take it well. In the end it perhaps was best not to fret too much and get it over with. In a way he was glad that him meeting Chanyeol's parents and being introduced as who he really was, had happened quickly and relatively painlessly. So in conclusion, he did not actually feel wronged. He wasn't sure how to put those thoughts into words, however, so rather than to try, he simply reached up and awkwardly touched Chanyeol's arm with the back of his hand.
"Hm," Chanyeol said with a tiny grin. Sometimes Minseok had a feeling that he somehow understood what he meant, even if Minseok didn't manage to phrase it.  As if he could read his mind.
"So," Chanyeol began for what felt like the hundreth time. He sounded cheerful again. "Anyway, not that I'm trying to justify my actions but I mean, they are my parents, right? So they were there when I was so fat that the ground shook when I ran." Minseok tried not to laugh but did, which caused Chanyeol to wrinkle his nose in offense. Still, he continued, "And I have asthma and I'm near-sighted and apparently I talk in my sleep. Though to be honest, I don't know how my father would even know that. It's not like I can fall asleep in the same room as him. He snores. Loudly. I have no idea how my mother hasn't gone crazy yet. Sometimes I think she's secretly deaf and just very good at reading lips." He scoffed but then seemed to notice that he was starting to ramble because he cleared his throat. "But anyway, I mean, I've never been the perfect son to begin with but they never told me to change or that they didn't like me the way I am. So I figured that chances were high that they would still like me now. And if I like you, they would naturally like you, too. And well, I was right, wasn't I?"
"Mh," Minseok said with a nod. He felt a small sting und unwillingly reached for his chest when he thought of his own parents. He tried to ignore it but the harder he tried, the more the feeling spread like cancer cells. Families were different because people were different and he doubted that his parents would ever not love him. But he knew that his brother had been right in his assumption that, if Minseok ever introduced Chanyeol to them, they would refuse to see him until he promised them that he would go back to being the son they wanted him to be. Still, even if they didn't love each other any longer and even if they were disappointed in him, they would still love him. Wanting their children to be a certain way was their form of love. He knew that. But as he lay on his back in a house that felt so completely different from his, he felt suffocated to think of that love of theirs. Because Chanyeol's house prove that it could be different. Love like that could exist without conditions and without lies and without the constant fear of being a disappointment.
"Sunbae?" Chanyeol asked and the melody stopped as he shifted a little, probably to see Minseok better.
"Apology accepted," Minseok quickly said to stop the situation from becoming awkward but could tell that his voice sounded strained. He tightened his grip on his chest and Chanyeol wriggled a little before he continued to play his melody. It sounded hopeful and bright and felt to Minseok like a miracle. In his heart he felt a little envious of this person who could feel so comfortable in his own house, knowing that outside his door were people who loved him exactly the way he was. But beside that there also was another feeling that slowly spread and made everything else fade.
"Any secrets, sunbae?" Chanyeol asked after a while with a chuckle. "Any more pitchers with funny hairstyles you have met recently? Or any more obnoxious friends?"
At first, as he looked at the sun above him, Minseok meant to lie or talk about something irrelevant. There were a hundred stories he had told his sister when she had shared her secrets with him, and thousands of meaningless childhood memories. Around him were dozens of obnoxious people with dozens of stories because for some reason he seemed to attract people like that.
Then, he thought of talking about any of the regrets in his life. Those were his true secrets, the ones that carried names and that were like spikes in his heart. He regretted his envy of his brother as a child and the years they had spent not really talking. He regretted the lies he had told his sister. He regretted Hari and every girl he had ever hurt. But this wasn't the right moment to shed some of his guilt.
Finally, he whispered, "I think I'm in love." And as the words left his mouth, he felt as if he was floating in space, and as if he had listened to someone else uttering them.
"What?" Chanyeol asked in a voice that made it clear that he hadn't heard him properly.
"I think," Minseok repeated a little louder and could feel his heart beating as his hand held onto the front of his shirt. It was a feeling he had believed not to be capable of feeling. All this time he had believed that, even if he ever felt it, he would not be able to voice it out loud. But there in that room with the solar system above him and Chanyeol's elbow beside his head, he thought that maybe it was okay. Maybe it was okay it feel it. "I think I'm in love with you."
The melody abruptly ended with an ugly noise and when he looked up a little, he saw Chanyeol knocking the back of his head against the wall as he tried to jump up. Minseok lay very still and quietly watched as Chanyeol sat up and looked down at him with wide eyes.
"What?" Chanyeol asked in a shrill voice, this time not because he hadn't heard him but because he had.
Minseok wasn't sure what to say. He didn't want to take back what he had said, but as he felt the blood rise to his face, he wondered whether he should. For a few seconds he managed to stand Chanyeol's gaze but then he averted his eyes and lifted himself up into a sitting position. Because he was closer to the edge of the bed, Chanyeol now was behind him.
"Maybe I should just," he began awkwardly and held onto his knees. His first instinct was to run. Just pick up his bag, dash through the apartment and the front door and run until he reached his house. But if he ran and if he hid in his room, guarded by his parents, nothing would ever change.
"Sunbae," Chanyeol said softly and Minseok could hear him put away the guitar.
"You know, I never," Minseok began but then wasn't sure what he wanted to say. He was only scared of Chanyeol's response, so he didn't want to give him the chance to say anything yet. "I was..." he said and leaned forward until he looked at the smooth floor and the sock that was only half hidden under the bed. It was green with thin white stripes and something about the image calmed him. "I don't think I was very happy during the last couple of years," he said and immediately understood that those words were true. He had never given it much thought. He had not consciously feel unhappy but that was only because he had forgotten what happiness was supposed to feel like. For years he had lived without being alive. He had lived without dreams and hopes and wants, like a broken machine that continued to run without a purpose. "But I'm happy now."
Behind him Chanyeol sharply in the air between his teeth and then gently tucked at his arm but Minseok didn't turn around. He wasn't scared or embarrassed, not really. If anything, he was amazed at the realisation that his life had changed.
"Don't run," Chanyeol whispered as he moved a little closer and Minseok smiled bashfully. He didn't want to run either but running was what he could do best. They both knew that.
"I won't," he said while Chanyeol shuffled forward to sit beside him. As he moved, he managed to snake his arm around Minseok's until theis hands touched and linked their fingers. Minseok's left hand still felt a little numb compared to his right hand and there were times when he felt as if it had betrayed him. The bones in the hand had broken, only to heal, but it never felt quite right. It was never quite his old hand, never quite as useful. But with Chanyeol's right hand in his, it suddenly felt right. It was sweaty and shaky and as much part of him as every other of his limps.
"I'm not often speechless," Chanyeol said after a while and Minseok finally looked up to him. Chanyeol stared at their hands with a frown.
"But you are now?" Minseok asked and Chanyeol let out a choked laugh.
"Yeah," he nodded and furrowed his brows. "And I feel like I've lost my window of opportunity now. I mean," he began and then turned his face to give Minseok a lop-sided grin. "No matter what I say now, you'll probably ask yourself why I hesitated for so long. I'll probably end up looking like a fraud."
Minseok blinked at him for a second and then laughed. As he looked down at their feet on the floor, he suddenly felt a lot lighter.
"Do you want to try again?" he asked and tried to suppress his smile while Chanyeol eyed him curiously.
"Yes, please," Chanyeol said and then quickly put up his free hand. "No, wait a second. I'll need to prepare." He closed his eyes and took a dramatically deep breath. When he opened them again, he clapped his thigh like an athlete before a race and audibly breathed out. "Okay. I think I'm ready now."
For a moment Minseok could just stare at him with a smile. He could swear that his heartbeat loudly echoed across the room like the beat of a drum while Chanyeol slowly raised his eyebrow.
"Okay, sunbae, look, these things need to be timed," he meakly said as he wrinkled his nose.
"I love you," Minseok said for the third time and Chanyeol just gasped with wide eyes, as if he had heard it for the first time.
"You're hesitating again," Minseok noted and tried to sound exasperated.
"Ah," Chanyeol said and blinked as if he had forgotten to do so for the last minute. He adjusted his glasses as if they were the ones to be blamed for his lack of reaction. ". Yeah. Can you maybe...?"
"No," Minseok said flatly and pretended to try and stand up but Chanyeol held him down.
"Sunbae, look, I'm new to this," Chanyeol quickly muttered and moved forward to touch Minseok's shoulder with his forehead. "People don't normally tell me nice things. I mean, have you met my friends? They're a bunch of verbal abusers. All they tell me is how much I annoy them. And my family? Pah! They literally only tell other people all the bad things about me. They don't even thank me when I wash the dishes or when I don't complain about my sister who spends so much time in the bathroom every morning that I'm constantly late for school."
Minseok tried hard not to laugh. "Hm," he said shortly and turned away his head, in part to act offended and in part to stop himself from cracking up.
Chanyeol let out a frustrated noise into Minseok's collarbone and then quickly sat up again with squinted eyes. "Okay, wait, seriously, let's just," he began and straightened his back, only to then wildly look around himself. Then, he leaned forward and attempted to Minseok's knees to pull his legs in his reaction. In surprise, Minseok nearly fell off the bed. Chanyeol made a rotation motion with his hand and asked, "Sunbae, can you move a little and face me instead of the door? You're kind of facing the door right now."
Minseok snorted out a laugh but obeyed and shifted until he more or less faced Chanyeol who also moved back a little and placed his hands on his knees like a schoolboy. Chanyeol cleared his throat, took another deep breath and then said, "Me, too."
For a moment the words hung in the room like a faint smell. Chanyeol looked at him with a perfectly earnest expression and Minseok understood what he meant. Still, he asked, "You, too, what?" Because he was mean and wanted to hear it voiced out.
Chanyeol immediately looked flustered and hurriedly said, "I'm happy, too." Then, he frowned as if his mouth had betrayed him and not said what he had wanted it to say. "I love you, too," he added quietly in a low voice.
And Minseok could only look at him wide eyes. He couldn't move because his heart overflowed like a broken dam. He was washed away in the flood.
It wasn't the first time that someone told him that they loved him. His parents had often told him that they loved him, but they had long stopped doing so. Hari had once told him that she loved him but she had said it in anger. Other girls, too, had told him that they loved him but to him those had only been empty words. 'Love' had never been more than a term to describe a vague feeling he couldn't grasp.
But suddenly it meant something. Suddenly it was very real.
"See, now you don't know what to say either," Chanyeol scoffed while looking oddly insecure.
Minseok unwillingly laughed and looked down at his hands for a moment. Then, he stretched out his left arm and placed it in Chanyeol's chest. Even with his left hand he could feel his heartbeat. Even with his numb hand he could feel that it was racing.
"I'm not lying," Chanyeol said in indignation as he sensed what Minseok was doing and placed his own hand over Minseok's.
"Just checking," Minseok shrugged and Chanyeol rolled his eyes.
For a moment they simply sat like that, with nothing but the sound of their heartbeats filling the room. Then, Chanyeol leaned in and kissed him.
And for the first time Minseok felt safe. There were no people around them. No cars in the distance, no shrubs sticking in his back, no lady at a hotel reception eyeing him suspiciously, no friends trying to edge him on, no noises of the school at night. There was no need to be alert. There just was a need to feel.

Minseok had never understood the meaning of 'love'.
It had puzzled him and confused him and scared him and made him feel lonely. He had never believed it to be a word that would ever hold meaning in his life.
But suddenly he found himself in love and although it made a few things a little more complicated, did he feel as though he had the power to challenge the world to keep his love.

THE END

___________________________

.

.

.

Note: So... I've finally finished this thing and suddenly my life feels empty because I have to let go. This story has followed me for nearly a year.

First of all, I would like to thank everyone who commented on this. Your comments really always made my day.

To be honest, when I starting writing this, I only wanted to prove to myself that I can write something long without quitting. I tried not to edit this and to just continue with whatever I came up with. This was supposed to be like a daily drama that could continue forever because it's filled with too many characters and conflicts. Basically, I wanted to write something I enjoy, and I enjoy to write characters and dialogues. So yeah, that was how this started.

Also, I would also like to apologize for my laziness. I wanted to write without interruptions, so I did not have anyone proofread this and I know it's riddled with mistakes. I'm obviously not a native speaker and some of the typos I found months later are all kinds of ridiculous even to me. Honestly, I have no excuse.

So yeah... That's it then. Thank you and goodbye!