“He’s telling the truth.”

Kyuhyun was sitting, or more like half lying, on a brown, leather couch – his leg supported by two pillows and with a bag of ice cubes placed on top of it. He had his head bandaged and overall, he looked quite painful. His mind seemed to be preoccupied with some entirely different matters though.

“Truth? What do you mean truth?” Asked Hangeng, walking into the room with a glass of water in one hand and some pills, probably painkillers, in the other.

Kyuhyun rolled his eyes, reaching for the medicine. “The compliance of a statement and a generally accepted definition of reality,” he recited.

The Chinese chuckled. “I understood nothing from what you said. But I assume you mean Sungmin-ssi?”

“Yeah,” Kyuhyun nodded and gulped down the pills. “How is he, by the way?”

“He’s okay, I put him to sleep. He was really exhausted.”

“I can imagine,” murmured the younger. He then looked at Hangeng pitifully. “Hyung, help me. Have I really gone insane? I mean, it was so realistic, I…” He paused. He didn’t really know what to say. Should he search for some kind of excuses? Or do the very opposite?

“Kyuhyun-ah. Just tell me what exactly happened and then we’ll think of what to do next, okay?” Offered Hangeng sympathetically and so Kyuhyun did.

He told the other everything, even about his unexpected outburst of the emotions that he had thought were already the past, when he was playing that little game with Sungmin. He told him how he had been running, how he had tripped, how he got the shock of his life when he found himself surrounded by white fluff, how he had finally believed Sungmin this afternoon.

But then Kyuhyun realized, it was bull. He had actually started believing the other way earlier than after that well-incident, he just truly didn’t want to face it. Come on, Kyuhyun was a rationalist! He didn’t even believe in God, not really, so ‘angel’ was not an option for him! And yet he had a gnawing feeling that he had let the pretty boy plant a seed of uncertainty in his, very rational, mind.

Why else would Kyuhyun let him stay in his own house? Why else would he sleep so peacefully in his presence, when he couldn’t sleep if his own sister was visiting their house once in a while? Why else would everyone in his school act so at ease around him, not even knowing him, when most of the newcomers, especially in the middle of the year, always had hard time finding one friend in their school? Why else would everybody be suddenly so… happy, whenever he appeared in the building?

Why else, finally, would have Kyuhyun felt so affected by Sungmin’s words, that he’d let his long forgotten feelings get the better of him? Yes, his parents’ accident, his accident, was a traumatic thing, for both him and his sister, but they had overcome it. They had each other and there was no one to blame, really. That drunk man who caused the crash, was some old, miserable guy who had just lost everything that mattered in his life. Yes, Kyuhyun participated in the trial, together with Ahra; they had both listened to that man’s story and they had both decided to forgive him. He hadn’t been lying, it’d be impossible to imitate such strong emotions, the guilt, the overwhelming misery, the resignation to the world… Or maybe he had been just an exceptionally good actor. But Kyuhyun didn’t think so.

The important thing was, he thought he had accepted the new reality surrounding him and his noona, and moved on. He was just a normal teenager, like thousands other teenagers from broken families, he smiled, laughed, had friends, went out, he had his games. He even considered himself luckier than some other kids, like those poor things from orphanages, who never had the chance to actually see their biologic parents, who never had the chance to make any memories with them to keep and treasure. And it wasn’t like Kyuhyun was totally alone, he had his sister, who maybe didn’t come home often, but he knew she loved him just as much as he loved her. He also had Donghae, whom he practically grew up with, and who was a very important part of his life, even if he wasn’t planning on ever saying it out loud.

But here you are, it took a boy, a stranger at that, for him to remember and re-live all those painful moments from years ago, in a matter of one minute. One minute and few words were what he needed to lose control of his mind, and realize he still had some grief in him; some blame he wanted to put on someone else, to push it away from himself – because, despite knowing that he couldn’t have helped them, the unfairness of the fact that he was the only one surviving never quite left Kyuhyun’s mind.

It was difficult to deal with. Much easier was to disregard what Sungmin said, to just not believe him, to treat him like a madman; because if Sungmin really was his Guardian Angel, then it was more than tempting to hate him for what happened to his mom and dad. That was something he didn’t want to do. He has got around to liking Sungmin, to adoring his innocence and big, bright eyes, his bubbly personality and even their little teasings happening more often than not.

He didn’t want to hate Sungmin. He didn’t want to believe him. He didn’t want to remember the loss of his parents. He didn’t want to be sad again.

There was a lot of things Kyuhyun didn’t want to do. But now, he had no choice but to, at least, take Sungmin’s words more seriously, after what happened. Those feathers didn’t appear from nowhere.

“Kyuhyun?” Hangeng’s soft, professional voice made him jump on the couch, and the same second he hissed at the pain in his leg. “Sorry, you’ve been quiet for a while now… Do you want to continue?”

“Yes, I’m fine,” he answered, feeling like one of Hangeng’s crazy patients. “It’s just…”

“Just…?” Hangeng probed after another short pause from the other.

“Just… Gosh, just why did he have to do it?!” Kyuhyun shook his head exasperatedly. “It’d have been so much easier to ignore his words. Uh, but this? You can’t just ignore a bunch of big- feathers appearing out of nowhere and being stuck practically into your nose!”

“You would have fallen into that well if I hadn’t.” Answered him a quiet voice coming from the door.

Kyuhyun didn’t have to turn to recognize that voice, even if it sounded much weaker than usual. When he did turn to the entrance of the room, he realized why.

“Sungmin-ssi, you shouldn’t be up yet, you really need to rest,” Hangeng quickly made his way to the pale, shivering boy whose eyes never wavered as he was looking at Kyuhyun.

“I’m fine,” Sungmin shrugged, although his tightly clenched around the door-jamb hand was saying otherwise. “I’ve done things like that millions of times.”

Kyuhyun was perfectly aware the other only said that to check his reaction. The only problem was that Kyuhyun had no idea what would it be either. He kept quiet for now.

Hangeng looked between the two and decided to keep quiet as well. For now.

Sungmin continued. “And not only me, the others do that at a daily basis, too. It’s a part of our training, every one of us can do that, in fact, if at least one of us doesn’t do it for the whole day, then it’s—“

Kyuhyun snorted from the couch, making the angel stop in his tracks. “Then how come I haven’t seen thousands of feather-bubbles flying around the city, if it’s so common? How come no one has ever seen it?”

Sungmin blinked.

“You don’t have to lie, Sungmin-ah, it doesn’t fit you.”

“What!” Sungmin looked very much offended. “I do not lie, Cho Kyuhyun! Lying is a human thing, I’m not sure if I even can lie. I’ve never tried it.”

Kyuhyun raised his eyebrows skeptically. “You never told a lie? How’s that possible?”

Hangeng, who was watching the boys silently, furrowed his brow when Sungmin began answering. “You know, I have never felt the need to do so… And I don’t think anyone of my kind ever did, because, well. The place where we all live – or used to live in my case – is not suitable for lying. Everybody knows everything they need, and if one of us doesn’t know something, that means he is not supposed to. It’s very simple.”

“Kyu, I think… No, I’m kind of sure, he’s telling the truth.” Hangeng’s eyes wandered to his friend, who seemed to deeply ponder on something in his mind. “You were right. In my whole career I have never experienced someone like him. I mean, all of my patients are completely convinced of the authenticity of what they believe is true. But Sungmin-ssi is different. His symptoms… No, he doesn’t show any symptoms, or at least, not any normal ones. He is not crazy. You can always take him to someone else, I’m not the only psychiatrist in South Korea, but—“

“Hyung,” Kyuhyun cut him off, finally tearing his eyes away from Sungmin, and instead focusing them on the Chinese. “Promise me that none of the words that were said here is going to leave this flat. Ever.”

Hangeng nodded earnestly, and Sungmin looked like a huge weight had been just taken off his shoulders, as he sighed with relief and then grinned, making a ‘v’ sign with his fingers. The tense atmosphere was gone which Kyuhyun couldn’t be more glad about.

“Does that mean you believe me now?” Asked Sungmin brightly, quickly running to the couch to fix Kyuhyun’s pillow, check the ice bag and whatnot.

“I guess I do.” He sighed. “I’m just not sure whether it’s good or bad. And stop grinning like an idiot Min-ah, or I’ll seriously leave you here.”

“We should go by the post office,” said Kyuhyun when they were walking home, one of his arms resting on Sungmin’s shoulder, as the angel supported half of his weight. He didn’t really need such help, but Sungmin had been insisting and who was Kyuhyun to say no to those large, pleading eyes. That, and he liked the skinship with the smaller boy. “I haven’t seen the postman lately and it’s about the time for Ahra-noona to write.”

Sungmin shook his head. “Nah, you shouldn’t tire yourself too much.”

“Says the sickly pale one of us,” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes.

“Besides, I’m sure there’s nothing important there if the postman didn’t leave anything for you. I can go and check later. …And I’m not sickly pale, it’s called being fair-skinned.” He added proudly at the end.

Kyuhyun chuckled and didn’t insist.

When the sun set down, coloring the sky with every possible shade of red and orange, and the long day had finally come to an end, making room for the warm spring night, Kyuhyun found himself seated in his very own living room, on his very own green couch and with his very own angel’s head resting on his lap. He stared at Sungmin’s peaceful sleeping face, and couldn’t help but feel his chest tingle funnily, as if the heart inside had just woken up, yawning a little after the long rest, and desperately needed to get out, to greet the world and take a deep breath.

Sungmin had, using his secret aegyo techniques, succeeded in forcing Kyuhyun to grab his schoolbag instead of his laptop, and to study for tomorrow’s classes (even though there was nothing important or interesting to study for) instead of scheming, arming, trapping and killing one-eyed zombies.

“You have to help me anyway, Kyuhyun-ah, I’ve never studied those things,” he had pouted and really, you would have had to be a heartless bastard to not give in to that face.

“Fine,” Kyuhyun had groaned, defeated, pulling his body to sit up while reaching for the first book in sight. Geography. Boring. “What it is that you don’t know, then?”

“Everything!”

Kyuhyun hadn’t been surprised in the slightest when twenty minutes later, as he was explaining the structure of the Earth (somewhere between asthenosphere and Mohorovicic discontinuity to be precise), he heard a soft snore coming from his laps. He scoffed quietly at the boy. What, seriously? Oh no, he wanted to learn and learn he will.

Suddenly a long sigh left Sungmin’s lips, soon being replaced by a slight, carefree smile – and every thought of waking him up vanished from Kyuhyun’s mind without a trace. He watched closely as Sungmin was taking a breath after breath, finding it abnormally fascinating of a task; and when the angel’s forehead creased, probably due to what he was dreaming about, Kyuhyun frowned as well. No, this didn’t look right. Before Kyuhyun knew it himself, his thumb was already wiping the crinkle away, making contact with Sungmin’s skin just this second longer than necessary.

Kyuhyun wasn’t stupid, he knew he was slowly falling for this being, sleeping peacefully on his couch. How could he not? Sungmin was the kindest, most beautiful and not to mention cutest creature ever stepping on the Earth. But he is not from here, Kyuhyun reminded himself for God knows which time already. Sungmin did not belong here and he was not going to stay here forever.

Which was exactly the reason why Kyuhyun didn’t intend on doing absolutely anything about this blooming feeling of his, maybe apart from trying to decrease it to the size of his fingernail.

The angel boy shivered, probably from the not-yet-warm wind coming through the open window, and as if it was his second nature, Kyuhyun’s hand mechanically reached for the blanket to cover them both. He was just about to grab it, when a loud ring disturbed the peaceful silence of the room.

Kyuhyun cringed and quickly answered the phone, hoping it didn’t wake his angel up. He really looked like he needed those couple of extra hours of sleep.

“What is it?”

The voice on the other side laughed at his grumpy tone. “Am I interrupting something, Kyu baby?” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes and didn’t reply. “Is Sungminnie hyung there?”

“Yeah, why?”

Donghae giggled happily. “I was just wondering if he’s going to live with you; looks like I just won ten thousands Won, Minho won’t be pleased.”

“You bet on him staying at my place?” Asked Kyuhyun incredulously.

“Of course not!” Answered Donghae and Kyuhyun sighed, grabbing a glass of water. “We bet on you letting him do it.” The water from Kyuhyun’s mouth flew right onto the carpet as Donghae’s laughter sounded even louder.

“Very funny,” he mumbled.

“I know,” he could practically hear his friend’s grin.

“Is that all? I’m kind of busy right now.” Kyuhyun wouldn’t admit that even on tortures, but all he wanted to do at that minute, was to go back to observing the sleeping Sungmin. It didn’t happen for him to be awake, while the angel enjoyed his dreams. Quite frankly, it was the first time. And Kyuhyun would love to take every advantage of this rare moment, thanks.

“No, actually. You know, some guy has just called me. He was really weird and had that western accent. Or was it eastern? No, definitely western…”

“Donghae!”

“Right. So this guy wanted to contact our Sungminnie. Did he tell you anything about his friends? He seems to, you know, have them,” he chuckled at his own joke.

A bad, bad feeling crept up Kyuhyun’s spine. A friend? “What did you tell him?” He asked cautiously, not liking it one bit.

“Well, I told him he’s very likely at your place. And I wasn’t that wrong!”

Sungmin had never told him anything about having a friend. He only used ‘one of us’ when speaking about other angels, and he couldn’t have possibly made friends at school so soon without Kyuhyun noticing… At least not that kind of a friend who wants to know where you’re staying and why. No, something was wrong here. Very wrong.

What if it was someone after Sungmin? Someone who noticed something, Kyuhyun failed to notice himself? What if someone suspected Sungmin to be just this bit too different from everyone else to simply be from another part of the country? What if it was the police? In disguise? Oh my God, what if it was the army! What if they’re here to take Sungmin away! To run some wicked tests on him!

He was panicking. He knew he was panicking. Panic wasn’t good in situations like this one, he’s gotta calm down. Now.

“Donghae hyung, listen to me,” he interrupted Donghae’s unstoppable stream of words about something he completely didn’t give a damn about, not now. “Don’t tell him my address, okay? If he calls you again. Just don’t tell him my address.”

“Too late, Kyu,” Donghae chirped through the phone. “He’s probably on his way, I just called so that you could clean up a bit! Your house is always such a mess whenever your sister is not around.”

Kyuhyun’s eyes widened.

Well, .

Not proofread, I'll do it tomorrow (again, lol). Hope you liked it nonetheless. Our pabo Kyu realized a couple of things here, and we also know what happened to his parents (finally hehe), but who is this someone who called Donghae?! If I were Kyuhyun, I'd have panicked too. And probably got my out of there, well. We'll see what happenes I guess. (And can someone, please tell me why this chapter looks like it's so short when in reality it has more words than the previous one? -.-'')

On the other note, is someone as whipped about Kim Hyun Joong's new song as I am? ...No? Oh, well then :p

I hate to tell you that the next update will most likely be delayed, because I'm going on vacation, because I can, because my koszernylosiu decided to invite me over, because she's awesome, because... yeah. If I don't manage to update before this Saturday, I'll be back in two weeks; so I hope I won't lose too many of my readers ^^''

~as always thankful for reading and commenting, with tons of love, puppysauruss ^-^v