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two years later, there will be two lovers. kim jongin and oh sehun. two dancers meeting behind the white-washed walls of studios, stealing glances and touches for the mirrors to witness. they'l be coated in sweat, their muscles strained with the steps, but it'll be worth it. worth it like the day jongin will cover sehun's room with white rose petals because they remind him of home, and home is something jongin wants to be to sehun.

months after this, they'll be a single entity; limbs wrapped around each other to the point where it's difficult to separate which is which.  not that anyone has to. jongin and sehun will both be the arms supporting the heavy load life dumps on them, they'll be the tears at four o'clock when it's too dark to see where the ghost of depression is hiding. separation won't do anyone good.

"you have me." jongin will say, rubbing small circles on sehun's back. and sehun will turn around and plant a kiss on jongin's lips because those three words will be enough to get him through the vigorous hours of practicing, all those minutes of 'you're not good. why are you even trying. give up.'. sehun's kisses will be fertile. they will bloom into reddish spots against the coffee-tone of jongin's skin. other times, they will be leafy remarks after dinner when their stomachs are filled with kyungsoo, their mutual friend's, kimchi spaghetti.

the vivid taste of spices will not be lost on them. in fact, it will be preserved by the heat of their tongues as they tumble into their bedroom, bodies moving in an unchoreographed dance only they could pull off. their names will be suspended in mid-summer's breeze whooshing through the opened window. shredded moans and frantic fingers. this will be what jongin and sehun is all about.

but it will not be all that splendid. come winter and you'll have sehun fiddling to zip his luggage. it will be stuffed with the nearest clothes on his drawer, his 'good luck' sneakers, and fragments of the night he caught jongin ing a man that of course, isn't sehun. yells will poison the walls where i love you's, you mean a lot to me, i'm not gonna leave you are hanged.

"please please please, don't leave me. i was drunk, please don't leave me." jongin will plead, words getting caught in the web of his muffled sobs.

"i don't see what's the point anymore." sehun will admit, hands tight on the handle of his bag, towing it down the bed and out of the room.

and jongin will not remember how he did it, but he will somehow manage to run to sehun and cage him in his arms, begging for him to wait for six minutes. that's all i ask. if i'm still not here after six minutes, then you can leave and i won't stop you. i won't wait for you or turn the whole Seoul upside down just to find you. i'll leave you alone. but please, stand still and wait for me. six minutes. 

five minutes later and sehun will be a mixture of sweaty palms and fidgeting toes. even before the long hand of sehun's wrist watch ticks to twelve, marking the promised six minutes, jongin will show up. he'll be ragged, eyes red and frantic. in his shaking hand, there will be a stack of white roses.

"i got them from the neighbor next block. i think the only reason why i made it on time was because their dog started chasing me." jongin will explain and sehun will puff his cheeks and bite his lower lip to prevent laughter from bursting out.   jongin will hand them to sehun, fresh and away from any domestic animal. tears will blur sehun's vision, because he nearly forgot white roses and how much they mean to him and jongin.

and jongin will suddenly drop on the floor, sit down to take one rose from sehun. he'll start plucking the soft whites and chant, "stay because you love me." then another petal. "leave because i'm a bastard."

"stay because i'm jongin."

"leave because i'm a bastard."

"stay because we still didn't finish watching the re-runs of running man."

"leave because i'm a bastard."

"stay because you won't have a valentine this month."

"leave because i'm a bastard anyway."

sehun will roll his eyes at the childish display, momentarily forgetting the suitcase beside him, recalling everything worth recalling. and a few minutes later when jongin is down to the last petal, it will say; leave because i'm a bastard. and even though jongin will avoid making eye contact with sehun because he's sure sehun will walk away, sehun will do the opposite and bend down to plant a kiss on jongin's lips.

and this. this. this kiss will remain rooted to jongin's incisors and will only wither years and years and years later when their hair will be as white as snow coating the ground.

two years later, there will be two roommates. their fate will be intertwined in the strings of connections and their need for financial support because it's not easy to live in a nice place in a nice area of the city. there will be luhan and kris. the singer and the math teacher. there will be weeks of trying to get used to each other, mornings of 'where the did you put my mug, you overgrown bastard?', evenings of 'if you're going out, don't forget to bring your keys. luhan, we both know  i'm not sacrificing a few seconds of sleep just to open the door for you. i never did.'

"yeah and that's why my is practically frozen." luhan will mumble while glaring at kris as he rubs his eyes. he will swear it's not cute even though somewhere in his heart, he knows it is. (especially when kris runs a hand through those lustrous blonde locks that luhan can just write an essay about).

with his eyes widening in disbelief and mouth shaped in an 'o', kris will walk behind luhan and smack his . "? where?"

darkening shades of red will taint luhan's pale cheeks, bringing out kris's favorite color in the entire universe. why else would he take delight in teasing his baby-faced house-mate? "i hate you! go rot in hell where satan can drill his pitchfork into your '' because according to you, i don't have one so i must be safe." luhan will proclaim and go back to the confines of his room, cursing kris from head to toe. he will not mean it. and kris will make sure luhan doesn't.

and of course, there will be secrets they would only keep to themselves. such as:

kris will tiptoe until he's in front of the bathroom every morning. he will do this every six forty-eight when luhan is showering while singing some songs. those songs will be about 'history' and more often than kris would like, they would also be about luhan's mother who's shooting anonymous people. (now, kris doesn't want to get involved in any sort of violent activity but sometimes, he will swear it's just sometimes, he thinks that every word that glides out of luhan's mouth is honey).

and this will be luhan's little secret:

he will pretend to be amused with taking pictures of inanimate objects in their living room. a DSLR camera will be strapped from his neck as he clicks the seconds away. it will take kris three days to get used to it, to get comfortable to luhan's weird habit, even. so by then, luhan will position himself in front of a flower vase, pressing the shutter button down and capturing kris behind the flower vase. click, zoom, click, adjust, click, new angle, click. a week later, his camera's SD card will be full. no problem. they're of kris so they're worth the space: kris frowning. kris crinkling his nose. kris with glasses and eyes squinted over the small print of test papers. kris and his tongue slightly sticking out in concentration. kris drinking water.

over time, they'll learn to mold themselves around each other.

kris will double check by leaving a spare key under the welcome mat outside their door, just in case luhan forgets to bring his. in turn, luhan cooks kris's favorite dishes every weekend, as a reward for the devastating, tiring work days. and kris won't be sure what he loves more; the noodles or luhan's voice as he sings while setting the table. maybe it's a little bit of both. maybe it's both combined. either way, they will give him those tingly-tingly butterflies in his stomach.

he'll think about it. groggy eyes will be glued to the ceiling of his room, and he isn't sure if it's the ceiling he's looking at because it's too dark. he will ponder over the complexities of luhan. what sort of equation he must solve to piece luhan together. kris will have nights dedicated to condensing his house-mate in numbers, exponents, equation signs balancing his value to what luhan can purge out of him.

ears would prick at the sound of pots banging against something like marble one night. alert, kris will run out to find what the ruckus was about. the question is luhan okay will echo in his mind, and it would disappear as he catches sight of luhan in the middle of their kitchen: wincing as he removes a large pan from his toes.

"here, let me help you." kris will say, wrapping an arm around luhan's waist and carrying him to a chair.

"i'm sorry for the trouble." luhan will lower his head as kris roams around for their first aid kit (he's a bit too much sometimes). "i got hungry and i knew you were sleeping so i tried to be quiet and because uh, i was a bit clumsy, i tripped and had these pans jerked off the shelf."

"a bit?" kris will be amused. luhan will shed bright red--again, kris's favorite color and kris won't be able to help himself as he walks to luhan and plants a kiss on his lips.

and this. this. this kiss will remain rooted to luhan's tongue and will only wither years and years and years later when their hair will be as white as snow coating the ground.

but that's not what we're looking for. it's not the future, but the present.

it's autumn now and leaves are blazing in red and gold until they burn themselves out and kiss the ground. people's footsteps will crush them until they resemble ashes. no one but luhan notices this, though. everyone else is too busy looking around. pedestrians with their eyes darting left and right, trying to cross the street without getting killed by zooming cars.

what a beautiful day, luhan takes a deep breath in an attempt to store the dust particles of this season in his lungs. his close friends call him a hopeless romantic. he's too aware to shrug away the nickname. but today, nothing matters. all that he could think about is the paper on his pocket: the address it contains and the wallet on his back pocket. three months of searching for a new places to live and finally his good friend yixing suggested this man who's looking for a flat mate.

"you'll like this dude. he's kris and he's chill man, chill." yixing had slurred over a bottle of soju luhan bought last week.

traffic's ruckus beside him brings him back to the present. it's two more blocks from here. just go walk forward and then turn left. it would be easy to find. luhan chides himself.

sehun started seeing things clearly after kyungsoo mapped the direction to the newest dance studio in their area. it's another bus stop away and he's already excited. no, scratch that. excited is goofy smiles, sudden dancing. it's more than that. today, sehun is euphoric.

what a beautiful day, he thinks and walks forward. if he turns to the right, he's going to see the bus stop and the first step to his dreams. dancing has always been something he loves doing.

however, his vision falls on something, or rather, someone before him. sehun slows down.



luhan halts when he feels someone looking at him. paces away, there's a lean guy clad in tight jeans and loose shirt, yet there's something in the way he wears them that makes them stand out. luhan likes that. but the look the stranger is giving him is not-likable.

sehun squints even though the sun's yellow rays aren't affecting his eyes. there's something about the guy before him that he can't point out. sort of like trying to remember something you know you can't think about again. they stand like that for a few seconds (maybe sixty. maybe a minute): sehun starting, luhan looking back, trying to act composed.

blonde hair, soft-looking skin, slender shoulders. sehun soaks this all in before shaking his head. he smiles and resumes to walking. luhan smiles back and resumes to walking.

sehun to the east.

luhan to the west.

it isn't until sehun is near the bus stop when he remembers: why he stopped for that guy who looked familiar. he turns back, but the man with blonde hair and fragile shoulders isn't there anymore.

it isn't until luhan is near the apartment buiding when he remembers: why he didn't flinch or started walking away quickly when they guy observed him earlier. he turns back, but the man with the squinted eyes isn't there anymore.

two years ago, there were two best friends. one an aspiring singer, the other a talented dancer. luhan and sehun. innocent in every sense of the word. luhan sang the melodies sehun danced to. underneath bridges and on sidewalks, these two would always showcase their talent for the world to see--and praise.

"i want to stay like this forever," it's sehun who said words like that and luhan who smiled and agreed. "don't you want to remain like this forever?"

"of course i do." luhan replied. twelve-thirty five a.m. and they're loitering on the streets, covered in all black with the aura of naivete still over them. sehun is just sixteen and luhan knows a lot better than him: talent will only get you far in life, connections are important, drink eight glasses of water a day, nothing lasts forever. he does not tell him that. he never told sehun everything he knows. luhan let sehun remained free, left him to his own devices but still kept an arm over his shoulders to protect him when the load gets heavy.

"luhan, i've--"

"hyung. call me hyung."

"but luhan--"

"hyung."

"fine, hyung." sehun huffed, clouds of cold air forming in front of his mouth. "i've read somewhere that octopuses have three hearts, isn't that amazing?"

"it is. it is," luhan grinned. sehun smiled, but it was more to the lines at the side of luhan's eyes, reappearing every time he smiles. more to the familiar features than to the inviting lips. "but if that's the case, do you think they love more than we do?"

not even a second. sehun reached for luhan's hand and announced. "no, they don't."

"how can you be so sure?"

"because, hyung, no one can love you more than i do. not even aquatic animals with abnormal features."

"you're comparing your love to me with an animal. wow, i'm so touched."

sehun bumped his hip against luhan's, eliciting laughter out of him.

"i believe in you, you can do it." sehun's words are what luhan bought with him on stage, and kept on repeating until he finished singing. this was his first performance inside a large hall, and he's on edge. thankfully, sehun with his antiques and random articles he found in wikipedia; i've read about this disease where you can hear colors and see sounds. calmed luhan down.

"thank you for everything," luhan said later that day, in between commercial breaks and sehun munching on a bar of galaxy.

"come on, you would have done the same thing, right?"

silence.

"right?" sehun is on his knees, glaring at luhan with puffed cheeks and clenched fists. "right?!"

"nuh-uh." laughing as if he's just said the smartest thing, luhan charged at sehun. his fingers were on sehun's waist--tickling him on his weakest point. in his arms, sehun writhed and hit him on the side. luhan held on, pushing them down the sehun's bed.

"sto-stop. please, please.s-stop!"

luhan let go and lied down beside sehun. sighs and residues of teenage stupidity occupied the space where their skins doesn't touch. nothing lasts forever, luhan closed his eyes and forgot those words. forgot facts and logic and the basic things that makes the world go round. being with sehun so close, just like this, defies all sort of knowledge.

science says its gravity that keeps things in place, but sehun's hands combats that. one grip over luhan's wrist and luhan is orbiting in his own axis around sehun.

the sun is the center of the solar system. well, luhan thought, they obviously haven't met sehun yet.

"hyung, are you okay?" ignore the angels' singing. luhan has sehun. he turned and planted a kiss on sehun's cheek.

"back to what you asked earlier. i wouldn't have done the same thing. i would have done them thrice as brilliantly as you did. when you're dancing, i'd make a banner and have it glow in the dark and i'll yell your name and call you oppa and then i'd go crazy and ask for your autograph and tell everyone we love each other. i'd spread that all over the internet and then--"

"okay, okay. i get it. i obviously lack the effort."

"no," luhan kissed sehun again, this time, there's a smile tucked behind his lips. "you're fine just like this."

"a lot of people are getting seriously worried over this influenza," luhan heard sehun's mother murmur from the kitchen.

sehun grabbed luhan by his waist, towing him out of the house before he could reply to anything. "come on, the earlier we get there, the better."

tangible darkness accompanied them as luhan drove sehun's mother's car to their 'spot'. it's nothing more than an abandoned field, though. but they could both swear over their own lives that it's the best place to look for stars. three hours, sleepy lids later, and they arrived in their 'spot'.

luhan and sehun are sprawled all over the ground, blades of grass flirting with their bare skin. none of them knew a single constellation, but it seemed fine as long as there are stars to carve their own constellations. "luhan?"

"hyung," luhan murmured.

"i hate you. hyung, do you think well, that what we have can withstand stuff?"

"what do you mean?" raised eyebrows and pursed lips, luhan studied sehun. sehun sounded years older than luhan.

"i mean, what if none of this would last? let's test ourselves."

"how?"

"hmm, okay. like what you told me a few months ago, nothing is constant, so let's say that in that future, we'll meet each other again without fail. when that happens, it means that we are, sorry to sound cheesy, meant to be. then we'll marry each other then and there. deal?"

luhan grinned. it's not like he could see himself with anyone else. twinkling stars bore witness as luhan agreed.

"deal."

"i'm going to have my son treated in seoul. what about yours?"

"beijing. his father is there and i'm sure a few months of vacation from this place would do my luhannie some good."

"let's hope. let's hope. this sickness has really been getting to everyone. i just don't understand why our son's conditions can be so severe. they're young! they should have been stronger!"

"hush now, don't fret over it. medicines these days work miracles. don't fret over it. if sehun is able to open his eyes i'm sure he wouldn't want to see you cry."

"it's still useless! you heard what the doctor said earlier, you heard that he's prone to losing memories!"

"don't fret over it, mrs. oh. you're not the only one who's son is suffering. my luhannie is, too."

today, sehun observes the streets as the bus moves faster.

today, luhan rings the doorbell of  the guy named kris's apartment.