“And our last story for today’s news is about the yearly Seoul Entrepreneurs Party that started just two hours ago. Many famous CEOs and other company representatives were present, but the main guest everyone was waiting for, did not show up. The press as well as the hosts of the event were highly anticipating the arrival of Byun Baekhyun but were disappointed when the head of Byun Enterprises failed to show up at the event. The main reason why everyone was looking forward to his appearance was the press conference Byun held three days prior to the party, declaring his love for his assistant and possibly confirming the relationship between them. The two haven’t been spotted together ever since the sudden confession and people expected this to be their first official public appearance as a couple. Kim Junmyeon, COO of Byun’s company was sent as the representative instead and gave us the following information;”

Baekhyun was glad the stupid presenter disappeared off the screen, but that feeling immediately got replaced by guilt when he saw the screen switch to footage taken at the party venue, with Junmyeon surrounded by reporters.

“So what is the reason you are here to represent Byun Enterprise instead of Mr Byun himself?”

“There was an emergency situation at the company and Mr Byun insisted to supervise everything himself until it is all resolved.”

“What kind of situation?”

“Unfortunately I can’t provide you with that information, but it’s nothing very concerning.”

“Can you tell us anything about the relationship between Mr Byun and his assistant?”

Baekhyun noticed how uncomfortable Junmyeon looked in front of the camera. He would usually go to events like this himself but he had totally forgotten about it after earlier today, so he was very thankful for Junmyeon for going since this party always was full of important businessmen that could benefit their own company in many ways.

“I’m not involved with Mr Byun’s private life, all I can tell you is that things at work are the same as they ever were.”

Baekhyun knew it was his own fault that the media were asking questions like this, maybe announcing it on national TV wasn’t that smart after all, especially since it hadn’t even worked. But it happened, and he should face the consequences, and he didn’t really care as long as he got Sehun back, even though it didn’t look like that was going to happen right now.

Junmyeon disappeared off the screen and Baekhyun thought he should probably thank him for covering him like that. He picked up his phone from the coffee table and turned it on for the first time in a few hours. While waiting for it to start up he went to get a new cup of tea. He didn’t really like tea that much but it was about the only drink available besides water.

It had been a while since he visited his vacation house. About six years ago he bought this wooden cottage, to give himself a place to get away from his normal hectic life whenever he needed to. Sometimes he wouldn’t come here for a year, other times he would drive here multiple times a month to get himself the rest he deserved.

While waiting for the water to boil he took a look in the fridge, as expected, it was empty. He hadn’t even thought about eating while he was here but right now he could feel his stomach grumbling slightly. But it was already close to midnight so he had no choice but to wait for the morning to get himself food.

After making his tea he returned to the living room and put the cup down on the table, picking up his phone instead. He swiped away all the missed calls and messages, but one notification caught his eye. It was from his security system, saying a vehicle entered his property, but the most disturbing this was, that it had happened just a minute ago.

He pressed the notification and he felt a bit nervous. The only people who knew about this place were his parents, Junmyeon and Jongdae but he didn’t tell anyone he was going here. They could just have guessed it of course, since this was usually the place he could be found after suddenly disappearing, but he somehow had the feeling it wasn’t any of them. If this was an intruder he would be in serious trouble, because Baekhyun had no idea how to defend himself and the nearest town was about half an hour drive, so even if he called the cops it would take them a while to get here.

But when the applications actually opened, it displayed the last name he would have not expected. He couldn’t believe it, but after blinking a few times he was sure he wasn’t imagining things. Right in front of him he saw not only a very familiar licence plate, but also the name of someone very familiar.

“Sehun…” he whispered to himself. With a mix feeling of excitement and disbelief he walked towards the front door. He slowly opened it and saw Sehun's car parked right in the middle of the driveway.

He peeked his head just outside of the door and looked around, but there was no sign of Sehun himself. What he did notice were the footsteps in the snow, leading from the car to the front door, and then away again towards the back of the house.

Not even caring to put on a coat, he stepped outside, the falling snow immediately melting on his warm skin, and followed the footsteps. The snow was really cold on his feet, who were only covered by a thin pair of slippers, but he couldn't care less. Sehun was here, and Baekhyun was going to find him.

He did wonder why Sehun hadn't just taken the front door, was it even Sehun who was on his property right now? What if someone stole Sehun's car to gain access to his house?

The idea gave him some additional chills alongside the ones he had gotten already from the cold. With a little more hesitation, he continued to follow the fresh traces.

Baekhyun could clearly see his own breath and wrapped his arms around his body to protect himself from the cold. He reached the back of the house and there was still no trace of the younger. But when he kept following them towards the other side of the house, he noticed that at one point they went into the forest, away from the house. He knew exactly where this path was leading, and wondered what Sehun, or whoever this person was, was going to do there.

This was the second time today he walked on this exact same path. But this time it wasn't with a peaceful, calming walk. It was a rather eerie experience, all alone in the dark, the cold slowly getting to him and making him shiver more and more every second. Luckily the moonlight came through the thick layer of leaves and branches above him pretty soon, indicating he almost neared the lake.

He reached the edge of the forest and when he looked down, he noticed something strange. He assumed the footsteps would lead him to the left side of the lake, where the small wooden shack he went to earlier was located, but they weren't. Instead they lead him to the edge of the lake, and when he finally rose his head, he saw someone standing there with their back facing Baekhyun. Earlier he had considered taking a fallen branch from the forest with him, in case he needed to defend himself, but he knew this person. Even when the dark sky in combination with the shining moonlight caused him to only see the silhouette, he could recognize him in less then five seconds.

He slowly walked closer, trying to make the least sound possible and see what the younger was doing here all on his own.

Baekhyun stood behind him for almost two minutes before he took another step and that's when the other finally noticed him.

“Sehun…”

Sehun quickly turned around and a feeling of guilt immediately spread all over him. Baekhyun was standing there with his bare arms crossed over each other and shivering like crazy, his skin red and blue from the cold and his soft hair all covered in white.

“Baekhyun!” Sehun wanted nothing more than run over to him and hug him, protecting him  from this weather, but he didn't know if Baekhyun would even allow him to come close right now.

“Why are you here?” Baekhyun said with a heavily shaking voice, his teeth chattering slightly after he spoke.

There was so much to say, but one thing had to be done first. “Can we talk inside?”

Baekhyun quickly nodded his head and turned around, making his way back to the house. Sehun just quietly followed but he still couldn't stand the sight of Baekhyun shivering so much that he couldn't even walk in a straight line. So he quickly took of his own coat and threw it on Baekhyun's shoulders. The elder stopped and looked behind him, making Sehun also halt his steps.

There was no ‘thank you’ or anything like that before Baekhyun continued walking, but Sehun had seen the small smile on Baekhyun's face, and that what all that was needed for Sehun to smile too.

“I'm sorry I only have this blueberry tea. If you don't like it I can get you a glass of water.”

“It's fine, thanks.” Sehun took the mug from Baekhyun's hands, causing a bit of an awkward moment when their fingers made contact. He watched how Baekhyun sat down on the ground next to the table, crossing his legs.

“Don’t you wanna sit here?” Sehun placed his hand on the empty spot next to him on the couch.

“No… I’m fine here.”

For the first few minutes they just sat there in silence and drank their tea. Sehun was mostly looking outside of the window, with occasionally throwing looks towards the elder, who was just staring blankly at the tv.

Sehun had come here to make sure Baekhyun was okay, but now that he had done that, he didn’t really know what to do next. He had ignored the elder for days, so the best thing to do first was probably to apologise to Baekh-

“I’m sorry.”

Sehun was snapped out of his thoughts by Baekhyun’s words. “What?”

“I’m sorry Sehun.”

Sehun looked down at his hands who were tightly wrapped around his warm mug “You don’t have to be.” He felt guilty because this wasn’t Baekhyun’s fault in any way.

“I gave you the wrong impression. I wish we could start over again because I feel I’ve handled things the wrong way.”

It made Sehun think about something “Do you regret anything? Like between us, not counting the past few days, do you regret anything that happened?”

“I mean… not really. I just feel like I should’ve done things differently with you.”

“I just want you to know, I don’t regret anything.”

Baekhyun looked at him in disbelief “But I thought… the whole buying gifts thing, I thought you didn’t like it.”

“It wasn’t necessary, you didn’t have to do all of that, but to be honest…” Sehun had never ever dared to admit this to himself, but he knew this was how he really felt about it “It kinda felt nice being spoiled like that, it made me feel special.” Sehun felt his cheeks redden and looked away shyly. “And I know I got mad about it, but I know now that was all a misunderstanding.”

“I can’t blame you for that. It's my fault that you didn’t know the whole truth and I think it's time I tell you about it.” Baekhyun put his mug down with a heavy sigh “So I assume Jongdae has told you about me and Taeyeon. And I’m not trying to make it a prettier story than it is, I just wanted her for pleasure, for . The fact that she saw it differently was her own fault, I will never change my mind about that. I never showed her love, or affection, it was clear what I wanted from her. I gave her gifts in return and took her to fancy restaurants to satisfy her, but I noticed over time she wanted more. One day she showed up to my house with all her stuff, saying she was going to move into my place. I only said yes because my house is so big I probably wouldn’t even notice her being there, but I was wrong…”

Sehun still didn’t know if he could be fully on Baekhyun’s side in this story, but he was curious how this was going to continue, so he just kept silent and listened to the rest of the story.

“It didn’t take long or she tried to get involved in my personal life. Not only did she want to take up all my free time, but she also starting to interfere with how things went at my place. She went as far as firing one of the maids that has been taking care of me since I was little, I forced her to apologize and things went alright for a few weeks, until she wanted to take our, what she called relationship, to the next level. She started talking about marriage and having kids and I told her to stop being stupid. Then one day she arrived at my office with a typed out contract in her hand…”

“What are you doing here so late? I was just about to leave.” Baekhyun was surprised to run into Taeyeon in the downstairs lobby of his company the on her free day. Especially this close to midnight.

“I have something important to show you.” she said with a big smile, showing him a paper she was holding “And I couldn’t wait till tomorrow. Let’s go back to your office and discuss it.”

“I just locked everything upstairs, let me see it here.”

She wanted to quickly hide the paper but Baekhyun was to quick and snatched it out of her hands. At first sight he immediately recognised what it was, he’d seen enough in his lifetime already to quickly come to the conclusion this was a contract. The more he read of it the more he started to laugh and he wasn’t even halfway when he folded it and gave it back to Taeyeon.

“So, what do you think?”

Baekhyun was still laughing out loud. “Did you really think I was going to sign this for you?”

“What do you mean?” Taeyeon said with a confused look on her face “You aren’t going to?”

“Of course not! What makes you think you could just come up to me and demand me to give a share of my company to you?”     

“But if you’d give me a share of your profits I’d be able to do so much more myself, I would even be able to treat you to something instead of you always spoiling me.”

“I don’t need anything from you.” Baekhyun sad in a cold way. “You know exactly what you are to me and that’s never gonna change.”   

“I know what I am! I’m your girlfriend for god's sake! All this time it’s been me who’s been putting effort into making something of this relationship, isn’t it time for you to do something?” Taeyeon was screaming now, her face red from anger.

“You wanna know why that is?” Baekhyun stayed calm, he already know how this evening was going to turn out but he sure he wasn’t going to regret it. “Because there is no relationship, it’s all in your head. You’re crazy Taeyeon, I’ve put up with you for long enough and  I’m glad you’re finally realising that you’re just insane.”

“I bet Jongdae told you the rest of the story, since he was there that night.” Sehun nodded in response “And you might be wondering why I am telling you all this now, but it’s actually really important. You know why?”

Sehun shook his head, his mind still blank from processing the story that Baekhyun had just told him.

“Because like I said, I never showed her any affection or love. And this is where it’s different form the situation with you. I’m not going to lie here, when I first saw you I was interested in you because of your appearance, but the more I was around you, the more I caught myself developing feelings for you.”

“So you wanted me to be like her?” Sehun was almost too scared to ask.

“Yes...” Baekhyun looked down in shame “Yes, it started out that way. But I’m not lying when I tell you it didn’t take long for me to see you differently and you know why? Because you’re different than all the others. I know you would never be after my money, or my power. You probably wouldn’t even dare to be rude to my staff at the mansion. It looked like you wanted to be around me as much as I wanted to be around you, and for the same reason.” Sehun smiled. Baekhyun was totally right. He wasn’t after anything Baekhyun had at all, he maybe would even prefer if the elder wasn’t this wealthy and well known. “These gifts weren’t to satisfy you, but to make you smile, just like you are doing now.”

Sehun shyly hid his face in his hands but he could still hear Baekhyun laugh. “You’re making me embarrassed.” he mumbled in his hands.

“I just hope you understand now Sehun, I should’ve told you a big part of this a long time ago. It’s not weird you got the wrong impression since my past can probably be found all over the newspaper and internet. I hope you can forgive me for keeping it a secret.”

Sehun removed his hands and nodded “The is nothing I can forgive you for. Like you said, it was a misunderstanding.” He suddenly felt a wave of sleepiness come over him and yawned.   

“You must be tired after driving for so long at this time.”

Sehun nodded again. It had been a really long drive and the comforting warmth of the fireplace was making him even more tired.

“Let’s just go to bed and return early in the morning. We can talk more at home.”

“I didn’t really come here to get you, if you wanna stay here a few more days I understand. It’s a beautiful place to stay.” It was the last thing Sehun wanted, for Baekhyun to feel like he was just here to fetch the elder and bring him back home, even if he did promise Junmyeon to do that.

“Nah it’s alright, I feel bad for leaving everything in Junmyeon’s hands so suddenly. But if you like it here so much we’ll definitely come back soon.” Baekhyun smiled. He stood up and walked towards Sehun, grabbing both hands in his own. “Come.”

But when Baekhyun tried to pull him out of his seat he suddenly remembered something. “Wait, check my coat.”

The elder looked at him in confusion “What?”

“My coat, check the left pocket.”

Baekhyun walked back to the spot he was previously sitting and picked up the coat that was lying there on the ground. He reached into the pocket and froze when he took out his hand again along with the small object the younger wanted him to find.

The elder was facing with his back towards the other, making it unable for Sehun to see his facial expressions, but he did notice the sudden stop in his movements. “Baekhyun?” There was no reaction so Sehun stood up and walked towards him. He stopped just a few centimetres behind him and looked over his shoulder. Baekhyun had the ring case opened in his hand and was just staring at it.

“How did you get this?”

Sehun smiled “You left it in your office.”

“You should've left it there.” Baekhyun closed the small box “This is the reason why things went wrong.”

“It isn’t Baekhyun” Sehun grabbed his shoulders and turned him around so they were facing each other “I just misunderstood the meaning of it. And I know I said earlier that I didn’t wanna change anything that happened between us, this is a moment I do really wish I could redo, but only because of my own reaction to it. So please…” Sehun took the box from Baekhyun’s hands and placed the ring back onto his palm, throwing the case aside.

With a small sigh and a smile Baekhyun grabbed the ring with his other hand and slid it onto Sehun’s thumb, staring at it for a few seconds and carefully studying it.

“Is something wrong?” Sehun asked.

“I just don’t really know what to say...”

Sehun smiled, seeing Baekhyun shy like this and even speechless was something really rare. “Just tell me what’s on your mind.”

And that’s when Baekhyun looked straight up into Sehun’s eyes “I love you.”

Sehun’s eyes widened at the sudden words. He didn’t really have an answer prepared for anything Baekhyun would have said, but this was the last thing he’d expected.

Baekhyun looked slightly panicked and nervously started talking in a very quick pace “I know I said it in that press conference and it was really wrong for me to do it that way and I really wish I would’ve told you like this for the first time so I’m really sorry again and I feel like I’m stupid and maybe this wasn’t the right moment either so-”

Sehun placed his lips on Baekhyun’s for a quick kiss, not only because he wanted to, but also to shut the elder up.

“I love you too.”   

a/n Sorry for the long wait you guys, had major writer's block but now that I finished this chapter I hope to update more frequently again 

<3