Another summer day, surrounded by the crowd, on stage with ten other boys, each one with a hand in his as they bowed to the crowd. He smiled a smile that didn't reach his eyes. He couldn't even hear the screams of the fans anymore, the sound just an empty noise in his head compared to the rush of silence that came with the lonliness in his chest.

Being ushered out of the venue and into the van, surrounded by a sea of people tugging on his clothes and squished into a van with no space. His legs propped over Baekhyun's because Sehun's bag gave him no space in front of his seat. Chen wrapping their arms together and leaning against the window. The others talking about food in an upbeat tone, tired but still happy. How could they all be so happy when he was so alone?

“Where do you want to go?” One of the others asked him, and all ten heads turned towards him while he ignored their worried expressions.

“I want to go home.” His response was in Chinese. How could he be bothered with Korean when his heart felt like this?

A few moments of subdued, vague replies, because who could really think up something to say to that, in the tone that he had? He sighed, dropping his head back onto Chen's shoulder. The other boy petted his hair softly, a comfort that rang hollow in his heart because those were just the wrong hands combing through his hair.

He pulled out his phone, looking at the background for a while before opening the text messages. Their last conversation still there, he pressed the button and started to write. 'Just got out of the concert. We did a really good job, but it still isn't the same without you.'

He paused, saved the message in his drafts. 'Memory almost full' displayed on the screen and another sigh passed through him. He flipped through his messages, written every day, each just a line or two, all saved to the drafts and never sent.

'How are you doing today?'

'It's raining again. It looks so sad outside. I miss you.'

'I miss you. Are you sleeping well?'

'I'm doing well. Are you doing well?'

Food got shoved into his hands and he ate it, not recognizing it or tasting what it was. Another hotel bed to sleep in and another morning waking up at four in the morning. Another airplane, a flight from Paris to Rome. Another concert and another hotel. Over and over until he no longer felt like himself.

He lived someone else's life, it seemed. Going through the motions, smiling when told and doing his best to keep it together. Stepping outside to the sounds of the crowd and the cheers, he knew he should consider himself lucky, but how could he when of the million people around him the only one he cared for wasn't around.

How was it possible to be so lonely while surrounded by so many people? Getting out of the concert, back in another bus, back in another hotel. Pulling out his phone once more and saving another letter he never sent. This routine, by now, had become habit.

Another winter day passed, months since that day. He'd done Paris and Rome. He'd collected too many unsent texts. He'd lost too much of himself, living a life that seemed only half a life without that presence next to him.

Curled up in his room, hugging tightly to an old, left behind, plush toy, he didn't hide the way he felt any longer. With the door locked, he couldn't be bothered. Though others would occasionally knock, ask how he was doing, ask if he wanted dinner. The only reply he gave was the sound of his sobs heard through the thin door.

No pictures hung on the wall of this room, the one they had once shared so long ago. He'd taken them all down in a fit of anger when he'd found the other had left. Occasionally, like today, when all the feelings got to him and he just felt too far away from the other man, he would still pull the box out of the closet and open it up.

Old, wrinkled, faded, thousands of photographs. The two of them, him, the group, every picture that he'd ever had of the older man stored away in a box forgotten in the darkest part of the small closet, pulled out only when he wanted to remember. The pain, fresh on his heart with the familiar eyes and smile staring up at him from the photo clutched between his fingers, the memory so strong in his heart and mind that he could still smell the salt of the ocean that day.

If he closed his eyes, it was almost like he was right back there again, in that happy moment. When things had been perfect. Then he would open his eyes and they would fall against the discarded guitar in the corner of the room. The one he hadn't picked up in so long. He'd taught the other man to play the instrument, spent hours together, just the two of them.

He crawled over to the instrument and pressed his fingers to the dusty, cold wooden body of it. Closing his eyes, he could almost hear the other playing it. He could see him, sitting there on the edge of the bed with the guitar propped against his knee. He strummed a chord, smile on his face. He could remember sitting on the floor, resting his head against a plush toy and smiling up at the elder as he played the one song he'd learned so far.

“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine...” He would sing along softly, and even now as tears dripped down his cheeks the words slipped from his mouth. A whisper, a mantra, a prayer thrown up to heaven, begging god. Begging anyone.

“Let me go home..” He muttered. Home. Not this place, this place where he lived with ten other guys, spent a few nights a week and most of his time travelling and in hotel rooms. Not the place his parents lived back in China. No, those places to him weren't home.

Home, to him, was the one place he would never get to go again. Home was the arms of that man who had gone and left him behind. He couldn't blame the man, though. Their dreams weren't the same. The other man had needed this, needed to follow a different path in life, and they couldn't be together.

That didn't make it hurt any less. He screamed, biting onto the plush he'd held in his arms to muffle the sound. Tears streaked down his face more, and he'd long since stopped wiping them off. His heart hurt, torn and broken and wilting away, and all he had left to do was sit in this room and destroy himself.

“I want to go home...” He whimpered again, and just fell against the floor and laid there for nearly three hours. It could have been longer. If fact, it probably was longer. The sun had ceased to shine and it was faded moonlight filtering in through the window and casting a glow on the empty bed.

He looked at it, imagining the shape of another man sprawled across it. The image shattered and something else caught his eyes. A suitcase. Hidden beneath the bed, tucked away and gathering dust. He pulled it out, wiping the hard silver case with his hands. With a sigh, he made the decision.

Swiftly flitting to his feet, he walked over to the desk and scrawled a note in messy Korean on a piece of scrap paper lying there. He grabbed the suitcase and unlocked the door. The clock from the kitchen blinked four in the morning. The entire place was deserted, everyone in their beds. Tao smiled, shoving on his shoes and walking out of the apartment.

He pulled out his phone and typed a text message. “It'll be alright. I'm coming back home.” And for the first time in two years, he hit the 'send' button with a smile on his face.

Author's Note: To all my readers that like to do Roleplays, I'm starting up a new one! I used to have an RP on here called Jaeneung School for the Gifted. I deleted it after I stopped having time to take care of it, but it ran for 2 years. Now, I'm starting up another called The Darker Side just go check it out? It's sort of Cops and Robber's AU where your character is either a criminal or a policeman and you get to stir up chaos in Seoul. So, please go check it out cause we want members so we can start having more fun Rping! For all my subscribers who join, I'll even write you your own fic request. any pairing, any genre. come on...join! :D