i wanna hide the truth.
i wanna shelter you,
but with the beast inside
there's nowhere we can hide.
-demons, imagine dragons

 

three things cannot be long hidden:
the sun, the moon, and the truth.
-buddha

 

when it wasn't pissing him off, sehun was amused to no end that one simple little touch had spread his body into an uncontrollable wildfire. everything he had ever feared, ignored, evaded in his mind was flashing behind his eyes at the most random moments. in the middle of the sidewalk on the way home, in the painstakingly absentee blur of unconsciousness he could hardly call sleep anymore. all because luhan had been a mischievous little bastard with unsustainable curiosity. in the twelve days since sehun's most interesting thanksgiving to date, the older man had apologized half a million times.

 

but sehun couldn't really blame his exploded time bomb on someone when it have been steadily ticking for his entire life.

 

'i'm so-'

 

'if you say sorry one more ing time i am gonna punch you,' sehun cut off yet another apology from the redhead who was sipping a beer next to kai on the leather couch sehun had that first wolf dream on.

 

somehow, sehun was now hardly ever alone or maybe never was to begin with. there was yue in the early morning then his old men conversation partners. pete and kai filled his day as well as the steady flow of customers. by the time he closed shop and headed home luhan and kai, sometimes yixing, would be waiting on his tiny front porch with sacks of takeout or just beer or left overs the doctor sent in neatly labelled tubberware bowls.

 

'but,' luhan began to pout but kai tossed a pillow in his face which only started wwiii right there on his sofa.

 

at the sight sehun grabbed the sketchbook that was resting precariously on top of the television and let his pencil fly over the paper. it was rough, soft in the corner of laughing eyes. it caught the warmth of comaderie and halfhearted insults. it was a scene that was fastly becoming something close to familiar.

 

when he had come to on yixing's bed with the doctor peering down on him, sehun would be lying if he said he hadn't been scared less. but despite his fear, despite the urge to run, he had sat in the lamp lit glow and listened.

 

listened to more history then he had ever learned form the potbellied coach he had in high school. listened to how yixing had met luhan ten years earlier in north carolina where he was getting his pre-med degree. how luhan was exiled from his tiny pack of rare red wolves and left to his own defenses until yixing had taken him in like a brother. how the duo had stumbled upon a half starved, untamed pup they christened kai in the backwoods of washington state while visiting the orphanage that yixing had grown up in. they had formed their own lopsided family, adoptive brothers that shared the bond of fur that was sometimes so much stronger than blood.

 

when yixing had stepped into the small town doctor role, luhan had settled too. kai had hardly stayed two months before he had ran off. yixing just barely touched upon the years that kai was absent. starting back his story when kai had started working for sehun up until how he had out.

 

sehun knew too much, but not enough. there were so many questions that he kept trapped on the tip of his tongue, boiling his stomach into an unsettling war of unknowing

 

'you're doing it again,' kai said crouched in front of sehun who had been staring blankly for too long.

 

'too close,' sehun shouted and threw his only weapon, his sketchbook, into the face that was suddenly filling his vision.

 

'was this your grandmother's?'

 

sehun turned from the amusing sight of a shocked kai and felt his stomach clench. luhan had a hand reaching ever closer to the jade crystal ball resting like temptation on a platter. before he could get past thinking no!, kai was knocking luhan back in a blur of movement with a snarl drawing his pretty mouth into a splay of white teeth.

 

'don't touch,' kai bit out while luhan flinched from his sprawled position half on the floor, half on the sofa. 'you have ed up enough already.'

 

'get out.'

 

both visitors looked at sehun with wide eyes. he cradled his throbbing head between shaking hands. the moment kai had irrationally lost his cool, a sharp drive of needles began pricking at the back of sehun's squeezed tight eyes. nausea had a tight fist on his body and he really did not want another blackout session. handling them two at once was too much. one on one he could handle.

 

'luhan, stay.'

 

kai flicked up a brow at the request and went form taking in sehun's pale face to observing the worry on his brother's face. the needle points turned into pick-ax hammering until kai had slammed the door and roared off on his motorcycle. the farther away he went, the less sehun felt until it was simple throb and pulse.

 

'look, sehun, i didn't mean any harm,' luhan murmured while chewing on his lower lip.

 

'i'm not mad at you. i just,' sehun took in a deep breath to settle his nerves. he plopped on the couch next to luhan and felt a strange urge to drop his head onto the older man's shoulder. never having physical contact plus the outcome of their last touch, he was gun shy. the look in luhan's gaze was nothing but accepting, encouraging him to continue.

 

'go ahead. ask away,' the redhead smiled softly.

 

'how did you know i have questions,' sehun worried for half a second that his thoughts were being read.

 

'i don't know. if i had just figured out i had inherited my grandmother's psychic abilities and that one of my employees was werewolf, i am pretty sure i would have a question or two,' luhan smiled around the green of his beer bottle and sehun felt some of his fear subside.

 

'i want to know,' luhan folded his legs up to his chin and peered at sehun from over his bent knees. 'how have you gone twenty three years without touching someone?'

 

'this is a small town. everyone knows who my grandmother was. they are just as afraid of this curse as i am,' sehun guzzled the lukewarm beer until he deposited the empty bottle onto the floor with a clang.

 

'it's not a curse, sehun. it's a gift.'

 

that statement had him looking at the redhead in disbelief. 'being able to see memories and thoughts and ing tomorrows is not a superpower that i ever wanted to sign up for.'

 

'what is it that you are really afraid of? is it real just this,' luhan gripped sehun's hand.

 

his mind was flooded with a kaleidoscope of images. the warmth of a home then the sudden loss, knuckles busting yixing's lip then a tongue out to sooth the wound, finding a scraggly mess of a wild boy. then the morph of jongin growing into kai with warm palms as guidance. the scene of his grandmother inviting luhan into the bright parlor, her eyes wide but smile soft as she welcomed him.

 

'i haven't met a wolf in quite sometime. especially one as special as you.'

 

'what's so special about an outcast like me?'

 

'you will protect someone i love. that makes you not only special but blessed.'

 

sehun pulled away his hand and pressed it to the fast forwarding images that were burnt like fireworks on the inside of his eyelids. he could still smell the herbal scent of his grandmother by the time he looked at luhan again.

 

'when was that,' sehun asked.

 

'the day before we found kai. we drove up the coast and had stopped for gas in town. we passed this house on our way out and i saw her peeking through the window when we passed. i made yixing turn around.'

 

'why?'

 

'because she spoke to me in my mind,' luhan smirked. ' do you want to know a secret?'

 

sehun rolled his eyes. had he not been bombarded with enough impossible knowledge already? what would one more tidbit hurt? 'why not?'

 

'he can hear you. that's why he left while we stayed.'

 

sehun blinked. once. twice. luhan patted the top of his head and moved to the door to leave.

 

'that's why he came back.'

 

he could hear the door open, could feel the rush of fresh crisp air flood in, but he couldn't see luhan. his mind was full of a different face, one that he had memorized. the eyes, trapping his with each glance. the mouth, more likely to lay flat then flutter into that ghost of a grin that he remembered from childhood.

 

hours after luhan left, he still sat in the same spot. afraid to let sleep take him, for the night visions to flood his mind. he had one thought on repeat, drowning out everything except he can hear you. so he took a chance. he closed his eyes and breathed out. his whole nervous system was bursting with electrical short circuits.

 

'is it true?'

 

this time he knew the howl wasn't part of a dream, never was to begin with. it burned sehun from the inside out, until he was nothing but a shivering skeleton. until he was nothing but a bag full of demons, memories he refused to touch. until he tumbled into sleep with his doors unlocked because he felt safe for the first time in his life.

 

-.-.-

 

sour alcohol breath was a smell you did not just simply forget. it was rich in his nostrils, it clung to his senses until he was sure he would throw up at any moment. but that would make things worse. the blurry shadow of his father would glow red and would throw him against the wall. he knew because that is how he had broken his collarbone.

 

'stop your whining, brat.'

 

wait that wasn't his father's voice. sehun looked down and realized he was not in his body.

 

'i'm sorry,' came a shaking voice from his lips that weren't his. it was such a familiar voice, one that rang like clear crystal bells. .

 

he felt the blow before he saw it coming. a thick fist plowing into the tender flesh of yue's belly. pinpoints pressed behind his eyelids and he silently chanted 'stop it, stop it, stop it'. but the hand returned to lift the boy by the back of the thin neck. sehun could practically feel the bursting of capillaries beneath the skin. it pained him to know that the fingerprints would leave a brand on the innocent flesh.

 

that whiskey fire breath was moist in his face, hot enough to burn. sehun couldn't see the face so close to yue's because the boy's own eyes were squeezed shut. 'i wish you could ing disappear, like your mother.'

 

sehun felt his blood boil. his own father had once said the same to him. except his was followed by a backhanded slap that had busted his lip wide open, sehun had lied and said he had gotten hit by a baseball while playing. so instinctively he braced himself, waiting for the repercussion but it never came. the hand left his neck and dropped the small boy into a crumbled ball on the linoleum floor. yue's eyes cracked open, hot tears spilling from the corners, just in time to see the boot pull back and come flying at his ribs--

 

'sehun!'

 

when he came awake, he was shaking uncontrollably. there were hands gripping his shoulders and he fought like hell blindly trying to free himself. fight or flight had his body bowing up off the couch, legs kicking out to find leverage. fear he hadn't felt in years was suddenly sunk talons deep in his throat. he could hardly breath.

 

'sehun, stop! it's me. calm down.'

 

sehun turned his head, searching for the voice. he was met with amber eyes that were practically glowing in the dark. he wondered for half a second as how kai had gotten into his house before remembering he had left the door unlocked. he wondered if it had been a subconscious invitation to the wolf, he supposed so. he arched out a hand and flinched when he felt kai's link with it, but there was no jarring flash in his mind. come to think of it, the first time they had shook hands all he had felt was a jolt of electricity. interesting.

 

'jesus, i thought someone was trying to kill you,' kai took a deep breath and let it all out in a whoosh.

 

'not me,' he croaked out.

 

kai pulled him up into a sitting position before disappearing only to return with a bottle of water that he had to unscrew the cap off of because sehun's fingers were limp with adrenaline crash.

 

'how did you know-' sehun cut himself off after draining half the bottle when he caught sight of kai's arched brow and tiny smirk from beside him on the sofa. 'never mind.'

 

'you know, luhan has never been able to keep a secret,' he chuckled in fondness. it sent a tingle down his spine and had him internally questioning their relationship. he was stopped mid-puzzle by the abrupt burst of kai's laughter catching the air on fire.

 

'what,' sehun questioned wide eyed.

 

'if luhan heard you just now, he would probably never talk to you again.'

 

'heard what?'

 

sehun flinched when kai lifted a finger to tap at his forehead when he realized what the older man was trying to convey, he sputtered. . that meant every time he had been lost in thought, drawing kai, remembering their forest hideaway, when he pouted over yue in his mind, kai had heard it all. a blush skipped creeping and turned his face into an instant red glow.

 

'it's not a constant thing,' kai says while cradling his hands behind his head. 'i think you have a natural barrier, that you just don't know how to control yet. it's mostly when you dream or outright think of me.'

 

the mention of the dream had sehun standing suddenly. he glanced at the clock above the fireplace, 6:39. without a word to kai, barefoot and dressed in yesterday's clothes, sehun burst out the front door. running faster than he ever had before. fear was back again, clawing at his stomach and causing his thighs to quiver from exertion. he could only half hear kai yelling after him, cursing about stupidity and cold and no shoes. sehun didn't care. he had to get to the garage now, ten minutes ago. he felt like he was running in slow motion. struggling to take just a simple step forward, but he couldn't stop.

 

not when yue's cries were again fresh in his ears. not when he could feel the little boy's injuries like phantom wounds on his own body. , he was moving too slow.

_____________
a/n: guys, i am so sorry for taking so long to update everything. this past month has been crazy. anyways, i decided to split this chapter in two because it just felt right to do. don't hate me for leaving you hanging. so far i think this story will end up being six or seven chapters long. if you have any suggestions or questions just let me know.

i want to thank everyone for continuing to love this story. new subscribers, and lovely comments even when i haven't updated in a month. you keep me going. thank you.