••••••••

            “Hello?”

            The voice on the other end of the line is unfamiliar. It’s bright and excited, despite the fact that it’s twelve in the morning, and Sehun is immediately irritated with it. It probably has more to do with the fact that he’s been tearing his hair out for an hour trying to find Luhan, but rationalization means nothing when you’re already at the end of your rope. Sehun’s voice is colored with panic.

            “Hi, can I talk with Kyungsoo? It’s urgent.”

            The voice sounds a little worried, but he’s at least obedient. “Yeah, sure, I’ll wake him up for you. Is everything alright? I’ll try to make sure Kyungsoo doesn’t tear either of our heads off for this— Hey, Soo!”

            Sehun hears a soft, feathery thud, and then there’s Kyungsoo’s voice, upset and accusing in the background. “Baekhyun, what the , I have work tomorrow—”

            “Someone called for you, and they said it’s urgent! They sound really scared.”

            “Does that mean you have to throw pillows at my head? Why can’t you just shake me like a normal human being—”

            “If I’m going to subject myself to your unquenchable rage at twelve A.M., then I’m going to at least have fun with it.”

            “Why did I ever decide to room with you—” Kyungsoo’s voice is getting closer, and Sehun is starting to panic even more because he’s suddenly unsure of what he’s going to say. Hey, the little monster I brought by earlier today escaped. Can you help me recapture him?

            Sehun almost hangs up, but then Kyungsoo’s voice is there, gruff and slurred with sleep, and Sehun knows that if the line goes dead, Baekhyun will have hell to deal with.

            “Um… Kyungsoo? Hey, it’s Sehun. I was just wondering—”

            “Sehun?” Kyungsoo sounds so startled that Sehun wonders if there was actually somebody else that he was expecting. It occurs to him all at once that Kyungsoo actually has a life beyond work. It’s a revelation he would welcome any other time besides now, but he can feel the tick of clocks pushing him into a box. He feels like the mice that he and Jongin cornered as kids, and he hates it, hates it, so when Kyungsoo tries to start off their conversation with his standard condescending comment, Sehun silences him immediately.

            “Luhan is missing.”

            “What? You mean your little demon?”

            Sehun growls under his breath, but he outwardly confirms. “Yes. I need help finding him. I don’t know who else to call besides his friends, and I don’t have their cells.”

            “What about Junmyeon?” Kyungsoo asks, and Sehun stops briefly. Oh, yeah. I probably could have done that. “How did you get my number, anyways?”

            “Does it matter?” Sehun barks. He can practically feel Kyungsoo recoil because no matter how sarcastic Sehun is, he’s never sharp. “I just… I need your help. Please.”

            “Since when do you need anything from me besides your insult fix?”

            “Since…” Sehun rests his head on his arms briefly before looking back up at the road. “Since you talked to me like you actually cared earlier. About lying to Luhan.”

            Kyungsoo drifts into thoughtful silence. Sehun wants to punch the steering wheel, but he doesn’t. A car passes him on a solid line, and he wants to honk his horn, to run into the back of it, to do something to express how livid he is with that goddamn car as an extension of the world, but he doesn’t do that, either. He forces himself to wait, and it pays off after a minute of quiet, when Kyungsoo finally exhales and says, “Fine. Do you have any idea where he might be?”

            “I’ve been checking around all the roads in town. I didn’t think he could wander that far that fast, but I can’t find him at all. Not even a lead. I’ve been looking for an hour.”

            “Just tell me where you’ve searched and I’ll look where you haven’t.”

            Sehun gives him the information and hangs up after Kyungsoo has promised twelve times to text him with updates (and told Baekhyun to shut up nine times, as he apparently was insistent on badgering Kyungsoo about the “danger man” the entirety of the phone call). He breathes easier with a soldier backing him, and he briefly considers enlisting Junmyeon, too, but he decides against it. One is enough for his army, especially when that one is a Kyungsoo. He’ll probably be wielding Febreze as a weapon. Or a spatula.

            Sehun still isn’t really in the mood to laugh, but if he was, he would have probably let a good chuckle loose at the idea of Kyungsoo in a military-styled apron, freshening spray in one hand and various kitchen utensil in the other. He turns down another backroad, slowing down to check in every front yard, and in every backyard, too, if he can see back far enough.

            It’s another forty-five minutes or so before there’s any lead, and it’s from Kyungsoo, not him. His phone beeps a merry tune, and he snatches it up and scrolls until he finds it – a message under a number he hasn’t had the chance to save as Kyungsoo’s yet.

            I found him. He was wandering in some neighborhood. I’m sitting with him now, but he won’t get in the car with me.

            Sehun releases a pent-up breath that’s been building in his chest all night. He goes to text him back, but Kyungsoo beats him to it again.

            He keeps asking for you.

            Sehun’s tears get a little too thick behind his eyelids, and he has to pull over to let them clear. He texts back with shaky fingers.

            Which me?

            Kyungsoo’s reply is nigh imminent. The you, you? He keeps mumbling ‘Sehun’ and insisting I find you and bring you to him. I think he might be a little inebriated. What other you is there?

            Sehun can’t reply. He’s too busy gathering himself enough to be able to drive again. Kyungsoo sends him another message.

            He’s still calling me Baekhyun. It’s starting to make me uncomfortable.

            Sehun finally manages to drag himself out of his stupor long enough to respond. Text me your address. He gets himself back on the road and in a general direction to nowhere when he gets a bundle of texts, all at once. He reaches down to palm through them.

            The first one reads one word. .

            Sehun’s heart stops for a moment long enough to put him in a hospital. Well, that isn’t a good start to this. He scrolls down, panic rising with each message.

            , Sehun, I spooked him. He ran off into the woods.

            God, I can’t find him, I can’t figure out where he went.

            I… I told him I wasn’t Baekhyun. I’m so sorry, Sehun. I didn’t know that it was because you were me.

            That doesn’t even make sense, goddammit.

            Look, I’m looking for him as we speak. Just come to the address I sent you. He shouldn’t be far from there by the time you make it.

            …I’m sorry. I’m so, so, so sorry.

            Sehun remembers the last time he got a bundle of messages – from Luhan, of the dandelion, our flower – and he recalls his stomach dropping then, too, but not quite like this.

            He floors it when he glances down at the address – and realizes he knows exactly where it is.

            He’d already checked there, but it makes sense now that Luhan would wait.

            Every time. Every single time I get too drunk, I end up there.

            Sehun isn’t sure where he went first. He isn’t sure where he got the alcohol, or how he’d managed to wander all the way back afterwards, but he figures it doesn’t matter. He knows where he is now.

            And he has to find him.

기억 – XII

상기하다 2013-5-1

“It feels so good to be on my own.

It’s lonely,
but it’s lonely when you’re surrounded
by people who don’t like you, too,
so I guess it’s alright.

I moved back near my old neighborhood.
Did you know?

It makes me remember.”