A/N: This is, firstly, for justwastingtime who made the request and then of course for everyone who's reading and  is feeling down (or not, I hope not). 

I hope you enjoy this! :D

*****

Chapter 1: Krisyeol

Kris was beyond annoyed.

What was up with the broccoli?

He had agreed to the noodles. He had accepted the green onions’ fest and had even kept his mouth closed when the cabbage had followed the other two in the mix.

But now broccoli?

Wasn’t Park Chanyeol a little too much?

Kris was a young and healthy man. Not to mention, a man who had spent the past twelve hours in a dance studio, working his off to learn a choreography that wasn’t half as easy as Kim Jongin claimed it to be.

In other words, Kris was tired and he needed real food. Like meat and rice and stuff that could fill his stomach.

When Park Chanyeol had suggested going out to eat hot pot, because apparently being the two tallest trainees was a big deal and they needed to celebrate it on their own, Kris had gladly agreed.

In Kris’ mind, hot pot was a big metallic plate that you just stuffed with meat that was boiling slowly as you filled your tired body with soju, or maybe rice wine.

Park Chanyeol, being the odd ball that everyone thought he was, had other plans.

First he took a million years to order. He kept asking for more time to look at the menu and kept pestering the waitress about whether the noodles were homemade or something silly like that.

Then, to Kris’ utter horror, he ordered a bunch of vegetables and put them in the pot one by one, slowly, explaining that vegetables should have a lot of space to cook well.

That was the weirdest thing Kris had heard in his entire life.

“Is this really Korean hotpot?” He asked trying not to glare at the other guy.

Park Chanyeol looked up from the boiling broccoli and gave him the most oblivious glance Kris had ever seen on a person.

“We’re in South Korea. And this is a hot pot.” He pointed at the silver pot. “So obviously…”

Kris took a deep breath. This would be hard to explain.

“I mean, when you said hot pot, I imagined it would have red pepper and chili and sesame oil and vegetables, sure, but also beef and chicken and pork. You know… meat!” He stressed the last part.

“Why isn’t there meat..?” Kris sounded desperate even to his own ears.

Chanyeol squirmed uncomfortably and bit his lower lip.

“I was going to ask for meat later.” He said defensively, like Kris was being really childish to ask about that. “First we can eat the noodles, then the vegetables and then order meat and eat the meat and then maybe-”

Kris just had to interrupt him.

“And when do you plan on going back to the dorms? It’s already eight.” He asked and he didn’t mean to sound annoying and… fatherly, but apparently he did, because Chanyeol was now crossing his arms.

“We have vocal practice tomorrow at ten.” The younger boy said matter-of-factly and Kris just gaped at him.

“So you’re suggesting we stay here till tomorrow morning, waiting for meat?” He blinked a couple of times at the boy.

“Maybe…” Chanyeol said non-commitably.

“Yah! Are you kidding me right now?” Kris was being outright rude and he was painfully aware of it. Just like he was aware that he might have just ruined his chance to be friends with Park Chanyeol once and for all.

And Kris had wanted to be friends with the brown-haired Korean, who rapped so well and smiled all the time and wore baggy clothes as a rule.

Kris had wanted him and Chanyeol to be the kind of friends that would practice together and laugh together –well, Chanyeol would do the laughing Kris was a serious guy- and also go to the cinema together, or play some basketball.

 They could even stay in, watch horror films and get drunk. Then just lie down on the green carpet, next to the couch in their dorm and talk about the universe with their shoulders touching and their hands linking…

Kris had questioned before whether that kind of relationship really classified as friendship, but right now he was pushing that thought at the back of his head.

Because perhaps he’d never get to find out what kind of relationship he could have with Chanyeol, the way he had just shouted at the guy.

“Fine, fine!” The younger rapper put his hands up in surrender. “I promise we’ll back to our dorms before twelve. How about that?”

Kris pretended to think about it, when in fact he was just thanking the heavens that Chanyeol didn’t get offended by his shouting.

“Alright.” He said after a few moments. “But why didn’t you just order everything together?”

He thought he saw Chanyeol blush a little at that.

“If we just ate quickly, then we’d leave quickly and well… the point is, you’d leave quickly…” Chanyeol mumbled under his breath.

It was just a simple sentence and Kris could pretend that he never heard it, or that he didn’t think about it that much, or that his heart didn’t do a little jump after hearing it.

He could just ignore the hidden meaning behind Chanyeol’s words.

But Kris found himself growing more and more powerless in front of Chanyeol. And the things he could normally do, he couldn’t do them anymore.

So he did what every mature adult would do in a situation like this; change the subject.

“So you’re working on speed-rap, right?” He asked and even attempted to eat some of the broccoli.

“Oh! Yeah… Right.” Chanyeol nodded fervently.

“I heard you earlier today, you’re amazing!” Kris suddenly leaned forward, like he needed to be closer to the other guy to fully express his excitement, and on cue, Chanyeol did the same, until their noses were almost touching and their breaths were getting tangled up.

Only after he felt the heat from the hot pot burn his face, did Kris move back, awkwardly and with a redness that wasn’t caused solely by the hot food.

“Thanks!” Chanyeol beamed at him, yet he seemed more restrained as well. “I’m no good at dancing, though… And Jongin is so bossy! ‘Hyung stand like this…’ and ‘Hyung don’t move your feet like that…’ all the time.”

“I know, right!” Kris nodded. “I think Kyungsoo will punch him one of these days.”

They laughed softly at that for a while.

“The broccoli is not all that bad.” The older of the two commented after a while.

“Hyung… I’m not all that bad either.” Chanyeol said and apparently he had a thing for simple but meaningful sentences, because he kept doing it.

Kris thought he wasn’t going to survive dinner.

“Wh-what?” He knew it wasn’t very manly to stutter, but he didn’t have much of a choice.

“I said I’m not all that bad, hyung.” Chanyeol repeated, boldly. “I mean, I might be someone you must be very patient to eat with, but I will certainly buy food for you. And I might be a bad dancer, but I’m not a bad person.”

This time, Kris could not pretend his face was flustered because of the heat. He acknowledged that he was blushing and the reason was Park Chanyeol and his simple, meaningful words.

He had two choices, then.

Either act like it was no big deal and brush off the boy’s declarations as a joke; or say exactly what he wanted to say, like he did in his dreams when they were lying on their green carpet and their shoulders were touching.

“I knew all that.” He decided to go with honestly. “Why do you think I’m sitting here, starving, with you?”

A smile bloomed on the boy’s face and Kris felt strangely proud of himself for putting it there.

“Hyung, I’ll buy you lots of meat! Just wait!” Chanyeol assured, his whole face brightening even more.

“Shouldn’t the older one pay, though? I thought the older one pays in Korea.” Kris teased, yet the boy shook his head.

“Today I’m paying. Because I want to show Kris hyung that I am an adult too. I’ve already graduated from high school!” Chanyeol explained with a content grin.

“Oh! I see…” Kris chuckled a little. “Then I’ll pay next time. Is that okay?” He suggested.

However, that made the smile fall from the boy’s face. He seemed suddenly sad and angry and all the things in between.

“Next time… It might be too long before that comes.” Chanyeol frowned deeply. “You heard Manager hyung. We’re debuting in a few months. We have practices all day. You guys are moving to China…”

Kris sighed. It was true.

It had been so hard to relax lately. All he could do anymore was dream about the things he’d like to do with Chanyeol. He had no time to actually do them, though.

After their debut things would get even harder.

Hell, they wouldn’t even be in the same country!

It was now painfully obvious why Chanyeol had invited him out for dinner and why he was intentionally taking a long time to order.

“So what if we’ll have to wait a lot before we have hot pot again? I’ve waited for you to order meat for three hours already, even though I’m starved.” Kris tried very hard to sound happy and confident.

“If I can wait for three whole hours to eat meat, I can do anything!” He said downing a glass of rice wine for the effect.

“Maybe next time we meet for hot pot, we’ll both be old men. You’ll have a bad back, because Jongin forced you to dance for too long and I’ll have Alzheimer’s because my brain couldn’t handle all the schedules and programs.” Kris watched Chanyeol laugh at the mental picture of them as old men.

“But I’m telling you, even if I can’t remember my own name, I’ll still remember that I owe you, Park Chanyeol, a hot pot dinner.” Now, the older one was laughing as well.

“That sounds good.” Chanyeol agreed and they shook hands on it.

Then, the Korean tried to think how everyone else in their group would look like when they’d be old men and Kris just stood there listening and nodding.

They didn’t order the meat until it was eleven, too caught up in conversation to think about it.

*****

Two Years Later

Kris looked down at the boiling food with a satisfied gleam in his eyes.

“So y-you only w-want broccoli.” The waitress must have recognized him as EXO-M’s Leader, because she was already stuttering, but Kris paid her no attention.

“Yes, exactly.” He agreed and after a few more shocked glances he noticed her leave the table.

Chanyeol only arrived after half an hour. He looked disheveled, with his hair sticking on his sweaty forehead and the fashionable clothes falling strangely on his lean body, like he hadn’t even bothered to straighten them in front of a mirror.

“You- you’re back!” The guy panted and stared at him disbelievingly.

“Only a couple of hours ago. Our flight was delayed.” Kris explained. “I gave my luggage to Manager hyung and came here right away.”

“But you were supposed to spend Christmas holidays in Canada, with your parents…” Chanyeol fell heavily on the seat across from Kris, taking off his jacket and throwing it somewhere nearby.

“Well…” Kris shrugged, trying to hide the smirk from his face. “We’re starting the preparations for the next album right after the holidays and I’ll have to stay in Seoul for a few months for that. So instead of going to Canada, I invited my parents here.”

Chanyeol was staring at him, with his big, bright eyes. He didn’t let out a breath for a long time – Kris should know, because he was glancing a little too intently at the boy’s body all that time.

“I’m not joking.” The Leader assured and only then did Chanyeol start breathing again.

“I-I cannot believe it!” His grin was so wide it should have been hurting his face. “For how long are you going to stay then?”

Kris acted like he was thinking about it, even though he had already counted the days in his head.

“Five months, give or take a few days.” Five months, one week and three days, to be exact, supposing that they’d really have to do that concert in Japan next April.

“That’s amazing!” Chanyeol cheered and celebrated the news and he sounded like he really meant it, which made Kris relax a little on his seat.

Maybe they were famous now and maybe the same waitress who hadn’t even given him a second look the last time he was here, was now taking photos of Kris behind the counter, but at least some things had remained the same.

Chanyeol had real muscles now and his hair was no longer brown, but he was still Chanyeol.

And Kris felt very thankful at that moment, because he had really needed him to be the same.

When everything was changing around him, when the stages became bigger and bigger and the cameras flashed brighter and brighter, Kris needed something solid to hold on to.

“On a different note, Jongin is being a pain.” Chanyeol said after the excitement wore off a bit. He took a glass of rice wine and downed it with one go. “I’ve told him a million times, these feet,” he pointed at his legs, “were not made to do back flips. No matter how much he shouts, that won’t change.”

Once again, Kris thought, certain things never change.

“And I suppose Kyungsoo didn’t punch him.” Kris somehow returns to their conversation from two years ago.

“Oh, please! That ship sailed long ago. These days, Kyungsoo just hits him playfully in the arm and goes ‘Jongin-aaaah don’t be like this’ in a cute tone.” Chanyeol tried to mimic Kyungsoo’s cute voice and failed terribly. So he just rolled his eyes at the image.

“Aren’t you just being jealous?” Kris asks with a smirk.

“I might be, but that doesn’t make them any less ridiculous.” Chnayeol admitted.

“At least Kyungsoo can do the back flips.” Kris tried to disregard the lump that was gradually forming in his throat. Jongin was so lucky to have Kyungsoo in the same group as him.

“Oh, he sure can.” Chanyeol commented, thoughtfully, and then added in a whisper, “Do you think that’s why Jongin loves him so much?”

The Leader chuckled a little. “It would make sense.”

Then, a new idea popped in his head. Only, perhaps, it wasn’t exactly a ‘new’ idea, but rather a very old idea, that he had been pushing back all that time.

“And what about you?” Kris questioned slowly. “Why do you love me, so much?” He breathed the words in Chanyeol’s ear and moved back again to stare at the boy’s reaction.

Sure enough, Chanyeol was blushing.

It’s the first time they’re talking so openly about that thing between them, that couldn’t possibly be called friendship, because they had already gone past the shoulder-touching and hand-holding.

And, really, even someone as oblivious as Chanyeol should know the meaning behind kissing someone on the lips, backstage during SM Town L.A., and not caring that people might see you, or that the tears might smudge your makeup.

Admittedly, not one of Kris’ best ideas, yet he wasn’t sure what his body was doing at the time and it was all too much to handle; seeing the boy for only one night, having such a good time, only to leave the next day, taking different planes.

Kris forced himself to let go of his memories and focus on Chanyeol.

“I love you because you can wait.” Chanyeol whispered and his voice came hoarse with emotion.

To Kris, it felt like a thousand fireworks were going off inside of him and his heart was playing bongo with his eardrums.

In reality, though, he must have looked particularly rigid and awestruck, at that moment.

He was so shocked and happy and frankly, just knocked out by joy that he didn’t even notice the waitress from before bringing over the broccoli.

“Is this payback, for last time? And here I was confessing to you...” Chanyeol tilted his head questioningly. “I’m hungry too, just so you know!”

Kris chose that particular moment to shoot up and call for the waitress. “C-can we have some m-meat, please?” He felt a little bad for making fun of the poor girl for stuttering before. He wasn’t doing any better himself now and he was supposed to be a famous singer.  

“Meat?” The waitress blinked. “Of course, what kind of-”

“Just bring us some meat.” He replied hurriedly. “A lot of meat!”

Chanyeol in front of him was laughing very loudly.

“If you’re ordering meat, then it must really be love.” He bit his lower lip, reaching over the table and catching Kris’ hand in his.