When Kyungsoo arrives home, he is shoved forcefully into the wall by the door, hair disheveled and eyes clouded over. He pushes Kai across the hallway and into the room his grew up in, tilting his head around the corner to catch a glance of his mother and aunt sleeping lazily draped over the couch. There’s a plate of cheese and crackers sitting on the coffee table between the pair, half-eaten.


He shuts the door to Kai’s protest, marching over to shake his aunt awake.


“Aunty Kim!” he whispers loudly, shaking her arm. The woman wakes, dark eyes inquisitive and a tuft of wild hair sticking to the side. Kyungsoo giggles at her, picking her up and shoving her to the door.


“Thanks for looking after mum. You can go now. I’ve got… er… things to do. You know. University work. And stuff.”


“Should we wake your-“


“Nope. Let her sleep, she’ll be fine.”


He shuts the door in her face, racing over to the bedroom and opening the door to reveal a confused-looking Kai. He’s already removed his shirt that’s lying somewhere in Kyungsoo’s peripheral vision. The night lamp that sits on Kyungsoo’s bedside table has been switched on, illuminating one half of the room, while the other remains in darkness.


Kyungsoo curses just how messy his room actually is.


“Don’t you want me to meet your family?” Kai asks, clearly hurt. Kyungsoo feels this weird feeling in the pit of his stomach, urging him to swallow. It’s not like he hasn’t brought girls home in the past for his parents to scrutinize. Boys, though...


It’s an entirely different ball game. Pun intended.


“Ugh, thing is…” Kyungsoo begins.


“They don’t know about us, do they?” he asks. Kyungsoo hesitates.


“I didn’t even know I was attracted to guys, Kai. I broke up with a girl not even… wait… was it a week ago? It was a Sunday…” Kyungsoo shakes his head.


“Either way! My family think I’m still straight, Kai. Hell, I don’t even know what I am. Gay? Straight? Biual? I know I’m not transual, although my aunt says sometimes that my must be completely shriveled up or something because they’re so small…”


Kyungsoo blinks wildly as Kai stares at him.


“Oh…” Kai hums.


Oh.


Oh indeed, Kyungsoo thinks to himself. If he didn’t already look like a deranged and slightly psychotic red lobster before (because he’s certain his skin is red with embarrassment), he sure does now.


“My aunt is crazy,” Kyungsoo attempts to defend himself.


“She reads strange medical magazines and just assumes she knows everything and diagnoses people with random diseases! There was this one time she tried to tell the whole family my uncle had erectile dysfunction…”


“And did he?” Kai asks, quirking an eyebrow. Kyungsoo pauses awkwardly.


“He did… but that’s beside the point! She’s weird! She’s one of those psycho church people that throw bibles across streets at goth kids that wear too much black! She hates boys that like boys…” Kyungsoo trails off.


“She probably hates me.”


“I’m sure she doesn’t…” Kai assures.


“I’m sure she does!” Kyungsoo bites back.


“She’s an old cow that thinks everyone’s diseased and doesn’t love me!” A hand flies to Kyungsoo’s lips as his eyes scan the room, reminding himself that he really needs to get that pile mountain of socks into the washing machine some time. Kyungsoo feels filled with sickness so suddenly, it squeezes him and he can feel his walls crumbling around him.




Kyungsoo never truly felt like he fit in.


There were always guys at school ready to exclude him from soccer or football or rugby or basically whichever sport had become the craze. They had pointed their fingers at him and called him too many names for Kyungsoo to remember. But one name hurt the most.


.


But the younger Kyungsoo was not a . At least, he didn’t know exactly at that time that he even had an inkling interest in boys. So when the boys around him started to gain interest in girls and Kyungsoo didn’t, Kyungsoo started to get worried. What if it as true? What if he was what they called him?


Yuri was good to him, and she was there. Yuri was kind and put up with his slightly questionable antics without questions of her own. When she became his girlfriend, to everyone including Kyungsoo’s surprise, he had gained some level of popularity. He wasn’t just the anymore, he was a guy popular enough to have a girlfriend. He was a person, not an animal.


But then Kyungsoo met Sehun, and everything changed.


Sehun was called a too, but Sehun wore this taunt with pride. He was one of the most flamboyant kids at the university Kyungsoo went to, with his perfectly straightened hair that always ended up a different colour every other week, and that stupid array of bow ties he wore like he was strutting down a runway. They had become quick friends, and it was OK to Kyungsoo that Sehun was going out with a guy. Sure, Aunty Kim never liked him, but that never really mattered to Kyungsoo.


Sehun was happy. Why wasn’t he as happy as Sehun? Why didn’t Yuri look all that pleased either?





Kyungsoo really wasn’t expecting to break down into a sobbing mess, but then again he wasn’t exactly expecting that impromptu lunch date with Kai in which all they did was stare awkwardly at each other across the table and not order a thing aside from that free water that sat in jugs by the side of the kitchen counter.


Kyungsoo also really wasn’t expecting Kai’s arm to wrap around his shoulders and pull him into his chest, Kyungsoo’s tears of confusion soaking his bare skin; or the lips that made their way to his forehead and slowly down to his own. Kyungsoo savoured the kiss, relishing in the taste of Kai as the temperature of the room skyrocketed around them.


Kyungsoo loses himself in the moment, eyes slamming shut as he returns the kiss feverishly, his hands looping under Kai’s arms and snaking up his back for better balance. Kyungsoo’s so lost, and Kai feels like what he’s been missing for so long.


Neither of them notices the scornful eyes of Aunty Kim and the flash of her Samsung Galaxy S.