It’s somewhere between the saltiness of fish and chips and the scent of the fine turquoise sea where Sehun meets the young, exuberant man who goes by the name of Luhan. In the future, he will look back and think how the enigmatic man reminds him much of the ocean, ethereal and tangible and there yet oh so distant. Sehun is the type who’s meticulous enough to arrange stationery in perfectly colour coordinated piles but lazy enough to lose track of time as it slips away with the ease of sand through fingers, and as such he cannot quite recall the precise date of their meeting. What Sehun can remember though is that they meet in summer.

They meet in summer when a permanent stain of clear periwinkle lies across the canvas that is the sky, when flowers smile and wave cheerfully from the moist earth, and when the rays of the sun kiss all in its grasp, a warm hello and hug to anyone in the vicinity. Sehun remembers that he has never held much particular fondness for the decidedly warm weather, but he tolerates it because there is not much he can do besides pack up to say, Antarctica and he is much too cheap and realistic for that. He lives in a home where the ocean is his backyard and the beach his neighbour.  Whilst others would clamber over playgrounds, the young Oh Sehun would venture out and across the features of the coast, peering here, peering there, a mini tourist in the foreign country that consists of fine sediments and nooks and crannies that make up the beach. Every day the tide would bring in something new and take out something old, so it was seldom that he would be hit with the feelings of tedious boredom. Sehun has grown up as a water boy, so much that his parents have often joked that perhaps his body contains more saltwater then fresh, so finely attuned to the ocean is he.

This particular summer’s day is near the beginning of the season, at a time when the weather has just broken out of the freshness of spring but is still cool enough for the tall and lanky male to fold himself onto a bench with chipping paint, one hand slipping a phone into his pocket after checking the time, other one grasping firmly onto the warm brown paper bag from which the delectable scent of fish and fried potato strips wafts from with every jolt. The sky has nary but a few wisps of white plus the bold and bright sun, and after shifting positions until he finds the one that’s of most comfort (a tall tree grows a couple meters back from the bench, and it’s shadow hovers just over the right side of the seat in the afternoon sun), Sehun opens the bag and allows the leaking scent to fully attack his senses in all it’s delicious and salty glory.

Of course, when one has a famished stomach and food with the most tantalising scent imaginable before them, there is naught to do but scarf it down. Reaching into the bag and finding that the golden strips of friend potato are still warm to the touch, yet has cooled down enough to eat, Sehun wastes no further time and immediately begins on his meal, with a slight bit more elegance than vultures squabbling over their right to feed. He’s about half-way through the package, a half-eaten strip of fish stabbed roughly onto the white plastic fork commonly found in such fast food ventures when upon looking up only to be met with the bent figure of a male staring straight at him, his otherwise dull features are animated with the feeling of surprise.

 “Y-Yah!” An instantaneous and not by any means eloquent reaction, Sehun nearly drops the food in his grasp, so shocked is he by the sudden intrusion.

The doe-eyed stranger blinks at him, honey-hued hair glinting and golden in the afternoon sun. He’s dressed in a casual set of pants and a t-shirt, much the same as Sehun is himself. Other than a small tilt of the head, he doesn’t show much reaction to the other’s loud reaction to finding him face mere inches from his own.

“You,” he says, eyes unblinking, rose lips formed into a slight pout. “I’m hungry. Give me food.”

Despite the irrationally blunt manner of the youthful male that would most probably antagonise anyone else, Sehun can’t bring himself to shoo the other off. If a seagull approaches him now and choses to ask the same, the lanky teen has no doubt in his mind that he would shoo the other gone without a second thought, but try as he might to be his usual aloof self and turn away there’s something about the other that draws him in like a magnet to metal, a hapless man lured in by the siren’s call.

The young male lifts his head and offers the other a blank stare and an outstretched hand in which a now lukewarm paper bag rests. It’s a peace offering of sorts.

The honey-haired male smiles and accepts with a nimble pluck of a chip, runs a slender hand across the bench beside Sehun as if to check for a trap of some sort, then settles down with a sort of cloudy and bouncy naivety.

Rustling of a brown paper bag, occasional glances to the right, to the left, to the right, it’s the beginning of something bitter and sweet and intoxicatingly deep.

“Uhm…”

A softly-accented tone breaks the crisp silence and Sehun automatically twists his head to meet the gaze of the other.

“Yes?”

The honey-haired man stares at the bag Sehun holds in his grasp with the gaze of a bounty hunter coveting the priciest gem.

The lanky male gives a benignant smile, turns the opening of the bag towards the other and makes an offering once more; after the other reaches in, he doesn’t turn it away but instead lets the bag rest between them, a modern-day red string of fate in the form of sea, salt and clumsy fingers. 

Sehun learns many things by the time the bag contains naught but grease and air.

His new-found companion has many strange quirks. Sometimes he’ll tap at his chin when confused (which happens quite often), sometimes he’ll cross and uncross his ankles, a baby taking his first tentative steps of action; fumbling limbs and adorable clumsiness. It is a little strange, but Sehun takes it all in stride. When wanting more, the male will eye the bag for a bit, before shifting his gaze to Sehun – who would then nod and move the bag a little closer to the other male in allowance. At first the two munch in somewhat companionable silence, disturbed only by the rustle of paper, hum of the wind and occasional muttered apologies; the other is too busy eating to say much else after his initial declaration of being famished, and Sehun has no idea how to proceed after landing himself in such an interestingly bizarre situation.

It’s when the bag is emptied to half when the other speaks and informs Sehun of his name and age. It’s something new to add to his knowledge, and though the age is more than a little shockingly incomprehensible (is he really older than him?!) it’s a nice two-syllable name, the first of which makes one’s lips form into a small ‘o’ – and when Sehun repeats it softly after the other has spoken, returning the expectant smile with a subdued one of his own, he thinks that perhaps, perhaps this summer will not be as lonesome as the last.

“Luhan… hyung?” he fumbles slightly with the pronunciation of the name, yet likes the way it forms on his tongue, likes the way the other’s eyes light up like the tiny hued bulbs strung up at times of festivity. “I’m Sehun.” Social oblivion has prevented him from stating that it’s nice to meet him, but it doesn’t matter because the honey-haired man sends him a dazzling smile in return.

“Nice to meet you, Sehun-ah!”

Upon pronouncing his name, on the second syllable the other’s lips pucker up with the effort of accurate enunciation, and a very strange thought enters Sehun’s mind. It’s almost as if he’s been possessed, so queer is the feeling.

For an instant, Sehun wonders what it’d be like to lean over and allow lips to brush together.

-

Whenever Sehun takes the time to venture out into the mix of shops that flaunt both overpriced and ridiculously cheap food in a strange sort of propaganda with the intended target as the famished, he always seeks out what will be most affordable for a dinner for one. Sehun is a young man with sneaker-clad feet embedded firmly ten leaps deep into independence, but if there is one thing his life lacks, it’s a suitable social network. Sure, like any other he has his acquaintances and friends, but there has never been any he could place in the cluster near the core of his heart to truly hold dear. A wild nomad, aloof in attitude and ferocious in gaze, the lanky male is the type whom both intrigues and mystifies, a speaker on a pedestal, golden and cream robes draped in majestic design over his figure, so tantalisingly close and so devastatingly far. Sehun has always been alone.

Today, he approaches a pizza shop, one of many that line the jubilant and noisy street filled with the chatter of various tourists and citizens. Rays alternate between soothing and burning, obnoxiously large-lettered boards depict food befitting of a king with the price of a peasant. It is summer, a time where noise is a constant and joy tangible in the salt-scented crispness which is air. Sehun places his order, plucks out the necessary amount of money and passes it over, no change expected. It’s his first time placing an order where no money is returned, and in a crude sort of bareness, he curls his fingers into a fist before unclenching them and looking them into a pocket.

Oh Sehun has, for the first time in his existence purchased a meal for two.

Minutes later sees the back of his head out the door, hot pizza grasped delicately in his grasp, scent of tomato and cheesy bliss intermingling with the flowery perfume the ladies wear with equally floral-like chiffon. The tall male’s feet pave a purposeful path through the maze of people, kaleidoscope of colours shifting by, a lipstick red here, an earthy green there, flitter of buttercup yellow there.

It would typically be lonely being the only one unaccompanied on this fine sprightly day, but Sehun feels anything but. He does have a companion you see, in the form of rounded lips and twinkling eyes who can rather easily be summed up as ‘Luhan’.

“Remind me why I’m treating you when I’m younger?” he drawls out as he joins the other at the table they managed to snag some minutes before he set out to purchase their meal, taking the seat opposite the other and folding his legs neatly beneath the table. It is one of the many splintered resting spots dotted in various areas around, and from their position the two have an excellent viewing point of the impossibly blue stretch of sea.

The other gives an innocent smile. “Because you look older?”

A mock expression of displeasure distorts the other’s long features. “Just for that, I get first pick.” He intones, lifting the thick cardboard of the box and reaching in and swiping a particularly large slice. Of course, it’s not before allowing the briefest of moments to allow the delicious scent to register in his mind.

This is the fifth time the two have crossed paths, but the first meal they share after their initial meeting of fish and chips. It’s somewhat frightening, how easily Sehun has gone from an aloof and independent young man to a young child seeking Luhan like a child would their favourite playmate, but he can’t say he’s complaining, nay he’s much too selfish for that. Each time, the two have met by the sea, one the aqua liquid the other fine sediments of sand, drawn together and overlapping yet never overly reliant. It seems like the elder man never deviates from the water, Sehun reckons, the irony not lost on him as his own days are so often passed in lazy ticks of the clock down by the beach. It seems the two share this common similarity, at least.

Sehun has no longer opened his mouth to take a bit when the other swoops in like a fighter jet, all sharp angles and determined gleam. Luhan snatches the slice from Sehun’s grasp with quick, nimble fingers and chomps down like a ferocious kitten, one hand cupped beneath his mouth to catch any stray pieces that may fall.

The younger male shoots the other a scathing look which is not quite a glare. He would glare, only he can’t. Everything that is Luhan forbids Sehun from so much as contemplating the thought of shooting such a dangerous expression towards him, from the way his eyes crinkle in the purity of bliss that comes with such fine cuisine (a low budget does not necessarily equal to low expectations), to the bright cap resting on his honey locks which only serve to emphasise his childish features with its baby pink and periwinkle hue.

Inhale. Exhale. The young male sighs and reaches out to grab the next best piece, biting a sizeable portion and feeling content as the flavour registers on his tongue. Once he swallows, he takes another bite before remarking “I pay and you do this to me? Such a great hyung you are.”

Luhan gives a deceptively angelic smile before gobbling up the rest of his slice with grace unbefitting to his speed. “You snooze you lose, Sehun-ah!” He chirps, before grabbing another and proceeding to demolish that at the same intensity.

The younger watches Luhan practically inhale the food, before a worried crease of the eyebrows form. “Hyung, you don’t have to eat that fast you know. You’re going to choke at this rate.”

Honey hair glints in the sun as the other shakes his head and waves a free hand in dismissal. He’s so engrossed in the food that he barely spares the time to look up, eyes almost crossed, so honed in are they on his target. Sehun resists the urge to burst into cackles at the thought of the scene before him resembling a nature documentary. He’s not that immature. (Yes he is)

They eat in silence for a while, and it’s when the two have steadily eaten their way through a good chunk of the delectable food does something occur besides the occasional idle chatter. Out of the blue, the elder man doubles over, coughing and hacking with his face turned to the table.

“What’s wrong, hyung?” Sehun panics, one hand reaching over to pat his back, the other fluttering uselessly in the air like a butterfly indecisive as to where to land. He’s mentally freaking out, contemplating ringing the police, the firemen, the ambulance (the only one of the three which would serve to assist in this situation in the slightest), but no longer has he finally realised that his phone is at home does a slender hand dart out and, with all the speed and skill of a master thief snatches the last slice.

Luhan sits up, looking like the cat that got the cream sans fur, his smugness plain for the world to see as if it were bolded in bright blue font. “Did I worry you?” he wonders, before promptly choosing to ignore the younger male and eating with enthusiasm. 

Sehun stares, shocked by the fact that he has been played so easily. “I don’t know why I let you get away with this.” The lanky teen informs the smaller man.

The deer swallows his mouthful, cheeks deflating from chipmunk status back to young toddler, before grinning up at the other. “It’s because you love me.”

Sehun has no comment to that.

-

When husky rose is dusted along the eyelid of the sky and tiny pinpricks of light are visible, the two go on expeditions to wherever the confines of the area permits. They are army soldiers on a mission with helmets of colourful snapbacks (which they jokingly wear backwards, just to try out being ‘swag’) and rations of slightly molten chocolate and water. Their commando boots are sneakers and flip-flops, they leave remnants of their stay behind as sand and warmed benches, and their enemy is some incorporeal nightmare long since captured by one of the many dream catchers they spy hanging in an overwhelmingly scented shop. They enter the place out of curiosity, and exit with a woven anklet on each ankle plus the scent of musk and dry oranges clinging to the fabric of their clothes, the burden of adulthood and responsibility long forgotten in the evening breeze.

The other week, they explored the same caves which Sehun had ventured into as a child. It’s comparatively cooler compared to the hot noon sun waiting outside, and so it is with no regrets that the two venture deeper despite barely being able to see their own feet before them. Sehun recalls finding it peculiar, the roof being so much closer to his head than he remembers, having to bend almost double in some sections and being rather terribly hunched in others. He knows his grandmother would have a fit if she ever sees him in such a position that’s terrible for his posture (she had grown up in the age where appearances were everything, after all) but all he needs to do is jolt back to reality to a warm and echoing “Sehun-ah! Look at this pretty rock I just found!” and he’ll clamber forward regardless of the space, regardless of the damp and dark and the unknown, all towards that beacon of light beckoning towards him with that damningly bright smile gracing his features.

It turns out that what Luhan has originally believed to be a rock is in fact a very much alive and irate lobster, and so it is after much shrieking and splashing do the two finally emerge once more in fresh, open – and most importantly, evil sea creature-less air. They take a pause to turn to stare at each other, then in an unspoken pass of communication double up, hands on the soft sand and on their stomachs, mirthful features illuminated by the soft peach rays of the setting sun.

All worries escape the mind. No fretting about what’s for dinner or what’s happening the next day, for a moment it’s just Sehun, Luhan, and the sudden happiness and feeling of comical absurdity that has spilled from the depths of their hearts.

“Can’t believe you were so scared of a simple lobster!” Luhan wheezes out long after the episode. The two are seated on top of a large outcrop of rock, watching the waves lap at the base and wondering how long it’ll take for the tide to reach high enough to completely wash over their bodies and drag them out to sea. One reckons they’ll be long gone by then, the other wistfully stares out in the horizon and inhales the scent that practically runs through his veins.

Sehun kicks idly at the rock adjacent to the two, but not hard enough to shift it. They’ll need it later to make it back to the main beach, and dislodging it would be a very idiotic move. “Be quiet. You caught me by surprise.” He would sulk to himself, only the urge to glance up at the other’s laughing face is a notion impossible to resist. He does try, bless the man but within a minute his eyes dart back up so as not to miss anything, even for a second.

“You’re going to need to man up, Sehun-ah!” Luhan laughs as he reaches up a hand and rummages the dark locks of the younger male. “I can’t always be there to protect the damsel in distress.” He teases.

The younger male snorts and lifts the water bottle hanging limp by his side and to take a swig from the contents before responding “Hyung, I am quite sure you’re much more feminine than I. If anyone’s the damsel in distress, it’s you.”

The man’s honey hair seems golden in the backdrop of sunset and his features are outlined in an ethereal glow when he turns away, remains of laughter still on his lips to face the ocean. “Distress? Whatever would I have to be distressed about?”

A strange atmosphere settles over the two, the silence accompanied by the roaring waves down below.

“How would I know?” Sehun phrases carefully, watching the other’s features intently to see where he is going with this.

However like a tsunami, the moment retreats as swiftly as it arrives, taking with it stray feelings and leaving behind the two and their rock. Luhan lets out a chuckle that only sounds half-genuine. “Hahah! That’s a very good question, Sehun-ah.”

The conversation quickly slips back into shallow waters and soon enough, the event slips from Sehun’s mind. They stay on that rock for an hour longer before rising and, after helping each other reach the safety of the sand once more part ways.

“Let’s hope you never have to find out.” Luhan smiles gently at the younger before turning his back.

Sehun is confused. “Huh? What do you mean?” he wonders aloud.

He receives no response.

-

Sometimes they neither eat nor move, and chose to simply sit and stare at the sky or the ocean or even sometimes nothing, keeping their eyes closed shut and simply taking the time to enjoy the company of another, the perfect click and snap of a picturesque post-card scene complete with nonchalant poses and thoughtful gazes.

On one such occasion, the two are relaxing with their back to the gold and their faces to the blue, single obnoxiously large beach umbrella blocking both the view of the wisps of cloud and the pulsing heat that is afternoon warmth, a small price to pay for the avoidance of burning. This is one of their many lazy days, and after a suitable amount of time has passed, Sehun likes to surreptitiously open his eyes, shift positions slightly and – there we go, a clear view of the other’s features in all the high definition a DSLR cannot possibly hope to capture in flimsy film. You have to see it to believe it, a saying which is only enhanced by the sight before Sehun’s entranced gaze, his eyes tracing the contours of lips, of the milky hills of skin, of the steady rise and fall of life.

He is so close he can see and count each individual eyelash on the other’s face, take the time to estimate the length of each if he so desires. But no matter how many times he receives this opportunity, there is one feature of Luhan’s that he is unable to see no matter his insatiable yearning, and that are the depths of his doe-like honey orbs.

Whenever the younger fondly rewinds and replays memories of the day, he always hits pause on Luhan’s eyes. Sehun likes to say that Luhan has ocean eyes.

They’re not blue like the ocean, and it’s not their beauty which enables him to liken them to each other (not to say that such gorgeousness is not a given, but it’s not the main reason) either. It’s the depth, the impossible, the contradictory wisdom and innocence that is evident clear as day, as ethereal as night in those honey-hued irises and those pitch obsidian pupils, the interlocking hands of a grandfather and a young child. Many events witnessed and so many more yet to be experienced.

Sehun isn’t an idiot. He notices when the elder clams up, he notices when he doesn’t want to speak and would rather sit in silence, he notices when sometimes they could be anywhere – walking down a sidewalk, sitting on a bench, watching the seagulls swoop in and devour fish – and when he glances to the side, if he’s unnoticeable about it he can catch a strange sort of contemplative look with a dash of melancholy. Because he must remember, Luhan is undeniably older and as much as he would like to claim he knows a lot about the other (and really he does, he knows his laughter is contagious and his unhappiness a soft curl down of the lips), whilst he would be able to locate the exact shade of his lips in the paint section of a store (Strawberry Kiss three quarters, he thinks from memory) he would never be able to fully decipher exactly what gives Luhan that extra depth which is unattainable on paper.

Luhan is a wilting flower in a garden of weeds, a magnificent red rose now past its days of glory. Every rose has its thorn no matter how you may pluck at them, and Sehun is the one who has fallen victim to its snare, a quiet heart-wrenching red staining the recesses of his heart. 

Sehun has always felt that Luhan holds some sort of strange, other worldly beauty about him. It’s somewhere between the bewitching calls of a siren and the mischievous whims of a pixie, but there’s something there, something very real and solid yet insubstantial which marks him out from the rest, and the more infuriating part of it all is that no matter which way he may turn, no matter which direction he pleases, Luhan will incessantly fill his senses and there is nothing Sehun can do about it.

“What’re you thinking about?” a wondering voice disturbs his train of thought, and Sehun’s eyes snap back into focus and hone in on the curious gaze of his elder.

There’s no evidence of the depth. The lankly teen finds it both disconcerting and enthralling, how easily the elder is able to conceal the inner core of his being from him. Search as he might with a torch and foreknowledge, he’s unable to venture past the invisible line that segregates the shallow from the deep. The smile begins to fade from Luhan’s eyes. The line shifts a little further up, and Sehun knows he has to make his move.

“I was thinking about you.” He says, watching as an amused expression blooms on the other’s face and he ducks his head, only to raise it again and begin idle chatter once more.

The flow of conversation continues down it’s natural path, and after deciding that they really don’t wish to nap the afternoon away they rise, laughingly brushing the sand which sticks to their clothes and skin. Hands linger a little more than necessary, but in the end fingers are interlinked and an unanimous decision to go purchase ice-cream from the cheerful van opposite is made and, skipping and running and acting like clowns they run on over.

They’re in luck, there’s a sale today, the lady inside the van says as she spoons out another kid’s mint chocolate chip, the pastel green of which contrasts with his shockingly red hair. They pay him no further mind as he walks off, both wondering what the lady could be speaking about.

“For couples, it’s a half-price on the second cone.” She says, smiling to her eyes. “You need to prove it, though.”

Later, Sehun hits Luhan on the shoulder, chocolate ice-cream in the grasp of the other hand, head buried in the other man’s back in mortification.

Luhan chortles, takes a bite of his strawberry cone and knowing that Sehun still has his mind somewhere between embarrassment level nine thousand and the clouds, raises a finger to brush at his lips. The scent of the younger male lingers, and he closes his eyes as he concentrates on the mix of Sehun and sweet strawberry.

“Now you’ll be thinking of me even more.” He mutters to the younger male, who makes no sound that he has heard him, likely still not entirely in the zone.

A soft smile spreads on his lips, his eyes re-open and he stares contemplatively out to the ocean.

Strawberry kiss indeed.