He got in.

He - Park Chanyeol - got into his dream school, California Tech.  He almost doesn't believe the letter, thinking it to be some kind of hoax.   It's almost July, his friends all got their letters weeks ago.  Now he has it, and he wants to scream it from the rooftops.  There's even an inserted letter of apology from the dean, explaining his acceptance letter slipped from the pile.  They extended his tuition due-date as an act of apology. 

He sits there with a grin plastered on his face reading it over and over again.  He can't wait to tell his parents, his friends, Baekhyun-

Baekhyun.

His smile fades and he ruffles his hair.  His Baekhyun - with the prettiest eyes, delicate fingers, and the cutest laugh in the world - is in New York looking at apartments with his mother.  For them.  When Chanyeol's acceptance letter never came, he decided to go with his Baekhyun, who got into Juilliard.  He had come to terms with that.  He wants to be with Baekhyun.

But the letter...  He glances back at it.  He folds it back up and sticks it in the envelope. 

"Channie, I'm home!"  He hears his mother call from the front door.  "Come help me with the groceries!" 

Chanyeol tucks the letter into the pocket of his hoodie.  It's too late, he tells himself.  They had only just convinced their parents to let them move to New York together.  He has a future, and it's a beautiful one.  Maybe not the one he dreamed of, but he has Baekhyun and that's enough for him

"Coming!"  He calls in his deep baritone and jogs out the door.

xx

Baekhyun's face lights up when he sees Chanyeol waiting for him on the train platform.  Every time he sees him smile like that, Chanyeol falls in love all over again.  Baekhyun drops his suitcase and runs toward him.  Thanks to Chanyeol's height, he's able to easily sweep him off the ground in a bear hug.  Baekhyun's mother laughs and shakes her head while she picks up the discarded suitcase.

They share a brief kiss--Baekhyun's lips always have a subtle taste of strawberry--before Baekhyun breaks it to talk.

"I found us the perfect place, you're going to love it so much!"  Chanyeol grins and Baekhyun laughs.  He  puts his boyfriend down and they go help his mother with the luggage.  Baekhyun spends the car ride home enthusiastically describing the campus, the little cafes he found.  He tells Chanyeol about the small, but cute little apartment in Manhattan that'll be so perfect. 

"And there's some schools in the city you can apply to next year, so we'll be okay."  Chanyeol nods.  He doesn't tell Baekhyun he got into CalTech.  He decides to not tell anyone.  Baekhyun's smile and the enthusiasm he has for their life together.  This'll be better.

xx

The attic of Chanyeol's house is their space.  There are trunks of old clothes and boxes of books long neglected.  Chanyeol managed to set a television up there with an Xbox so they could play games or watch movies together.  The floor is covered in pillows Baekhyun picked up from different places they'd travelled with school, or where he would go on family vacations.  They spent every day here since Baekhyun got back from New York two weeks ago.

Chanyeol holds Baekhyun in his arms, hands against the small of his back; the sunlight coming in from the circular window washes over them.  Baekhyun's lips are soft, and Chanyeol loves feeling his breath on his neck. 

"So is this what it'll be like in New York?"  Chanyeol giggles.  "Can you cut classes and stay home to cuddle me?"  Baekhyun rolls his eyes.  Chanyeol hugs him tighter.  "Come on, even if it's snowy and icky you'll leave me all alone?"  He teases. 

"You're incorrigible sometimes," Baekhyun says with his lips barely off of Chanyeol's. 

"That's what you love about me, besides my rugged good looks."  Chanyeol lightly kisses him.  Baekhyun laughs into their kiss.  A piece of Chanyeol wonders what life would be like if he got accepted earlier.  Would Baekhyun still be here in his arms?

xx

When Chanyeol wakes up, Baekhyun is gone.  He sits up (as best he can in the tight attic) and looks around.  A window is open, a soft breeze tickles his face.  He crawls over and out.  This particular window opens into a tree where Chanyeol's father had built a tree-house when Chanyeol was seven.  He and Baekhyun would watch the stars from it sometimes.

Sure enough, Baekhyun is there.  He's reading something.

Chanyeol digs into his hoodie and realizes what was in Baekhyun's hands.

"Baekhyunnie... I..."

"Were you planning on telling me?"  Baekhyun doesn't look at him.  Chanyeol bites his lip, and then crawls over and wraps his arm around his boyfriend.

"No, because I'm not going."  Baekhyun fits against him like he's meant to be there.  "I'm going to New York, we made a choice it's too late."  Baekhyun  glares up at him.

"But Yeol, it's your dream school.  You could go in the fall and not have to take a year off."  Chanyeol laughs to set the shorter boy at ease.  He doesn't let him know how hard it is to not just go.  But he knows if he does, he'll lose Baekhyun.  Long distance relationships don't work, he's never seen them work anyway.  And even if they tried their hardest, they'd be on opposite coasts, interacting with new crowds of people.

"I like the idea of not having tests and papers to write for a year."  Baekhyun still looks unsure.  Chanyeol tilts his face up  with a finger under his chin.  "I'm excited to spend my life with you, that's all I care about right now okay?"  He kisses Baekhyun and the topic dissipates. 

They watch the sunset together.

xx

Chanyeol sees less of Baekhyun after that.  Not by choice, something always seems to come up at the last minute and Baekhyun cancels their plans.  Chanyeol understands, it's his last summer before he moves halfway across the country.  His family are going to want to spend as much time with him as possible.  But it hurts to lay on the floor of the attic by himself. 

It's cold without Baekhyunnie to be his blanket.

On the first of August Chanyeol hears tapping on the attic window.  Baekhyun sometimes comes in through the tree house at night.  Chanyeol unlatches the window and the shorter boy crawls through.  He immediately notices something different about his boyfriend's demeanor.  His eyes are shifty and he fidgets with his hands. 

"Baekhyun, what's wrong?"  Chanyeol attempts to wrap his arm around him, but Baekhyun doesn't move toward him like he usually does.

"I've been thinking a lot."  Baekhyun's voice is breathy, unlike him.  Chanyeol doesn't like it.

"You shouldn't do that, thinking leads to overthinking, which leads to stupid ideas." 

"Chanyeol, I'm being serious right now."  Baekhyun snaps.  Chanyeol takes his arm off his shoulder.  "Yeol, who are we trying to fool?"  Chanyeol feels his lungs tighten and the contents of his stomach slosh.  He knows he's not going to like this, he knows it.   "We're a couple of high school graduates, foolishly talking about our futures like we know what we're doing."

"We do know what we're doing, and what we don't know we can figure out when we get there."  Chanyeol grabs Baekhyun's shoulders.  He doesn't like this Baekhyun, it's not his Baekhyun.  His Baekhyun would never doubt their future; his Baekhyun would never push him away; his Baekhyun would never say-

"We need to break up."

No, no, no, no, no.  Chanyeol doesn't acknowledge it.  He disacknowledges it.  He wants to will it out of existence.  He wants to cuddle Baekhyun on the pillows and forget this ever happened.

"I'm serious, Chanyeol.  We need to start thinking like adults."

"No, no we're fine, Baekhyunnie.  You'll see."  He struggles to maintain his composure as Baekhyun attempts to break his grasp.  He grabs his chin and kisses him roughly.  Baekhyun sighs into it and his body melts for a second-only a second-before he pulls back.

"Please don't make this harder than it needs to be."  He can hear his voice break.  Chanyeol slumps backwards.  "This is for the best, you'll see."  

Those are the last words Baekhyun says to him before slipping out the window, out of his life.

Chanyeol is very cold.

xx

It's his last summer in this small midwestern town.  Four years of college, a degree and a job offer have decided that he will spend the rest of his days in California.  Chanyeol slowly goes through the belongings that have sat in his house since freshman year, making a final pick of the things he'd throw out forever and the things he'll bring with him.

"This is you?"  Wufan, his best friend, holds up a picture of Chanyeol at about eight in a dressed as a surgeon for Halloween.  The costume was too big for him and the rubber gloves went up to his shoulders.  He beamed as wide as ever.  Chanyeol laughs.

"Don't go thinking you can use that as blackmail, that'll be mom's."  They'd almost finished boxing up his room.  He sighs and looks to the latch in the ceiling.  The attic.

He pulls it down and Wufan his head.

"I've got some up here too."  He climbs the ladder that falls down, and his friend follows.  Neither of them fit well, so they crawl around.  The pillows still smell like vanilla, like Baekhyun.  He tells Wufan to watch some TV while he goes through some of the things himself.  The taller shrugs, and boots up the Xbox. 

He puts the pillows in boxes to send to the Byuns, he was surprised that his mother hadn't already done this.  It'd been four years.  He crawls out into the tree house and finds it cleaned out.  As he's about to go back inside something catches his eye.  A pencil case stuck in the branches.  It was Baekhyun's, he'd recognize it anywhere.  It was something the taller won him at an arcade when their families went to Atlantic City.

He cautiously grabs it, it feels like he's digging into the scar on his heart.  He brushes the dirt and dust off of it and pops it open.  There's a string of goofy pictures from a photo booth.  One where he's biting Baekhyun's hat and Baekhyun is laughing so hard makes him smile. 

The only other thing in it is a folded piece of paper.  He recognizes the handwriting as Baekhyun's. 

Chanyeol, you're probably never going to see this.  But I need to save this moment, this pain.  I broke  your heart, I broke mine too, and I had to do it. 

You've always dreamed of school out west, ever since we first met in sixth grade.  Your face always shone so brightly when you would talk about the differences you wanted to make, the people you wanted to help.  I couldn't let you waste your life in New York with me.  I needed to let you go.

I love you too much to allow you not to get your dreams.

Chanyeol, my Chanyeol, you shine brighter than any sun.  You're not a caged bird, and I'm not a shackle.  I couldn't tell you to go, you wouldn't have.  We both know you wouldn't have, and we both know you'd always regret it.  You may hate me forever for hurting you like this, but that's okay.  I love you enough to let you go find your happiness.  And maybe someday, our paths will cross again, and maybe they won't.  But I'll be content knowing you followed your dreams and no one held you back.

Your Baekhyun.

The writing is smudged by tear marks, but whether they're Baekhyun's or his, Chanyeol could no longer tell.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

what have I dooooone