“Heartless, Baekhyun. You’re heartless”

Baekhyun woke up panting, cold sweat dripped down his back, sending a chill through his spine.

“Are you okay?” a voice asked beside his bed.

“Ahhh!” screamed Baekhyun, snapping his eyes shut after throwing a pillow towards the source of the voice.

“What the- Baek, it’s me!”

Baekhyun slowly opened his eyes, and saw Jongin smiling down at him.

“Oh, I’m sorry” said Baekhyun, face flushing rouge in embarrassment.

Jongin chuckled and softly hit his hyung with the pillow thrown at him. “Are you okay?”

“Me, uh yeah” said Baekhyun, sitting up in his bed and opening the blinds behind him.

Light fluttered into the room in horizontal lines. For a second, Jongin looked like he had stripes painted across his face.

“I heard you screaming…” said Jongin taking a seat on the bed.

“I had a bad dream” sighed Baekhyun, averting his gaze so his roommate wouldn’t ask any more questions. His tactic didn’t work.

“You wanna talk about it?”

“No.”

*

As Baekhyun took the subway to Park Enterprises, he tried to shake off the image of his mother’s face contorting into one that’s angry and hurt. If only the bad dream he had was just a bad dream, not a reality he had to live with,

*

When Chanyeol came down to unlock the gates in front of Park Enterprises, a smile broke out on Baekhyun’s lips.

“Hey, where’s Kris?” asked the intern, confused albeit pleased about seeing the scientist opening the gates.

“Oh he’s with Tao preparing their wedding. I gave him a few days off” said Chanyeol, a smirk stretching the corners of his peach lips. “It’s just going to be me and you today, hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all” said Baekhyun, suddenly feeling the need to hold his breath.

*

When they entered the elevator,  Chanyeol leaned his body against the wall, and without realizing it, Baekhyun glazed over the scientist’s long frame. His eyes seemed to automatically focus on Chanyeol’s broad shoulders, and the way his chocolate sweater hugged the curve of his biceps not to mention those beige corduroy pants which made his legs seem to go on forever-

“Hyung you okay?” chuckled Chanyeol waving a hand in front of his hyung’s face.

Flustered by the way he’d been staring, Baekhyun gaped at his feet “Yeah uh, sorry. I’m just having an off day-”

Thump, The elevator suddenly jerked up and down before coming to an abrupt stop. The bright lights that had allowed Baekhyun to admire Chanyeol’s physique flickered on and off before they fused and left the pair in total darkness.

A huge lump formed in Baekhyun’s throat. He had to get out and he had to get out now.

The walls of the elevator seemed to come alive in Baekhyun’s mind. Slowly parts of his soul came undone. Flashbacks of the past were returning and blinding him – making him feel like a jangled little boy stuck in a ditch. There were some things one never forgets, and Baekhyun could feel every single detail of that event come back to life now.

Chanyeol grabbed his shoulders and shook him.

“Baekhyun stay with me, help is on the way. They’re going to bust us out. Stay with me.”

Despite his efforts, Baekhyun’s suffocation multiplied with every passing second. His muscles tensed up, ready to spasm. He was frightened of the loss of his motor control, and the four walls engulfing him not to mention his embarrassment of lying on the floor, head in Chanyeol’s lap.  

The last thing he ever wanted was for Chanyeol to see him like this, at his absolute worst. Right now, he wasn’t the intelligent in control Baekhyun but a young boy scared of enclosed spaces. The thought nearly brought tears to his eyes, but he couldn’t even cry. All control of his body had disappeared, even Chanyeol’s voice had become inaudible. Sweat poured out of every pore,

           It is at this moment that Chanyeol did something that returned Baek’s body to his mind.

He laid next to him and wrapped his long, lanky arms around Baekhyun’s waist, pulling the older boy into his chest. Comfortable in Chanyeol’s arms, the black walls began to disappear and all that existed was the warmth of the scientist's body melting against his own.

           Baek leaned his head against the tall boy’s torso, and suddenly Chanyeol’s voice became audible again.

“It’s going to be okay. Just stay with me.”

Tears ran down Baekhyun’s cheeks, as he nuzzled closer into Chanyeol’s chest, startled by the warmth pooling in his stomach.

“Don’t think about where we are. Imagine that we’re somewhere else. Imagine we’re in your favorite place in the entire world.”

           Baekhyun clung tighter to Chanyeol’s body. When he closed his eyes, he saw a thousand daisies dancing in the wind. His skin glowed in the sunlight- and when he looked to his right, he saw Chanyeol. The scientist’s skin gleamed as bright as the smirk he shot Baekhyun before running into the fields of yellow suns.

           Baekhyun chuckled and followed him into vast ocean of daisies. When he caught up, Chanyeol turned around,  opened his arms wide and trapped Baekhyun in a tight embrace. All around there was nothing but flowers and beauty. The crisp air purified Baekhyun’s spirit, cleansing it of any darkness and sorrow. For the first time in what felt like forever, Baekhyun felt content.

*

“Hyung, wake up.”

Baekhyun’s eyes slowly opened to the pleasant image of Chanyeol sitting beside him. He tried to sit up but his muscles were too weak.

“Slow down there cowboy” chuckled Chanyeol, lightly pushing Baekhyun’s chest to get him to lie back down. “Let’s take it easy.”

“Where am I?”

“You’re in one of the patient beds in my lab. Seems like you always pass out here. First the anesthetic ice cream, now this” laughed Chanyeol, pushing his glasses up further on his nose.

Baekhyun smiled, not because of what the scientist said but just the mere sight of him. He’d never felt like this before. He wasn’t even sure what “this” was.

“Thank you for everything. I’m sorry about - whatever happened in the elevator. I-”

“No need to apologize. Like I said at my party, I know those meds you take aren’t for your allergy meds” replied Chanyeol, a knowing spark in his eyes.

Abashed Baekhyun sighed. “Well now I feel quite embarrassed.”

Sighing Chanyeol, slipped his fingers in between Baekhyun’s setting the older boy’s heart on fire. “Your fears are nothing to be ashamed of.”
 

Baekhyun was positive his cheeks gave away how flustered he felt. He attempted to change the subject by lightening the conversation. “Maybe. But I definitely win worst intern of the year. We’ve made little progress on finding a cure for the palvolia virus.”

Chanyeol laughed heartily, removing his hand from Baekhyun’s to clap vigorously. “Hey you got me 2NE1’s new album for my birthday, that automatically means you win best intern of the year.”

“So it’s that easy to win you over?” asked Baekhyun, chuckling along.

“Only for you” said Chanyeol in a deeper tone,.

Baekhyun gulped and looked at the ceiling, wondering if he should give in to the wave of emotion or run away from the soaring tide.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you feel weird” whispered Chanyeol.

“I don’t feel weird at all” replied Baekhyun, turning his head to make eye contact with the scientist.

“Alright, but out of curiosity though, when I asked you to imagine we’re someplace else what did you think of?”

“I um thought of these daisy fields right outside Seoul. It’s where my parents met. It’s the one place that’s so open and just...beautiful. Nothing can go wrong there, so I imagined us there.”

--

Seoul, 2011

Seung Jo was essentially lifeless. His blood carried no desire to live, and thus had become a burden for the heart to pump to the rest of his entire body. The life support machine kept his lungs functioning but without it, his lungs would collapse against the pressure of the surrounding air.

Seung Jo was no longer that young, muscular soccer player that fell for Eun Mae. He had lost everything that made him who he was. Baekhyun held back his tears as he watched his unconscious father lying on the hospital bed. The room reeked of blood and nauseating antiseptics. Nothing was quite  as nauseating  as the disappointment Baekhyun felt looking at his father. Time had run out, and his family would not be reunited. Sighing, Baekhyun pressed his lips against his father’s forehead.

“I love you dad” he said, taking his father’s wrist and feeling the flow of blood through his body. This was the last sign of life in Seung Jo, and Baekhyun cherished the moment, reeling in the glory of a heart beat.

    This sign of life no matter how beautiful caused Seung Jo a lot of pain. Baekhyun remembered him likening it to squishing a spider half way then letting it die in agony rather than stomping on it and giving it a quick, painless death.

    If Baekhyun knew anything about love. He had to be selfless, put another’s needs above his own desires. If he could have it his way, he’d come visit Seung Jo everyday just to hear that heartbeat but his father was gone. The cancer had metastasized to his brain rendering him in the vegetative state he predicted he would be eventually be in.

    There was no hope, and Seung Jo wanted to return to the stars. Taking a deep breath, Baekhyun turned off the life support machine, tears rolling down and stinging his cheeks.

    He collapsed to the ground and sobbed beside his father’s dead body. How would he muster the strength to tell Eun mae and Kyungsoo about his father’s death? How would they react to what he jist did, would they understand?