Tao spent the next six days locked in his room. He spent his days lying in bed watching cheesy horror movies on his laptop because everything else reminded him of his lost love and he quite enjoyed watching people’s lovers get eaten by badly animated sharks.

This should have been the first thing that tipped Tao off to the fact that he was going off the freaking deep end.

He barely ate, instead binging on the supplies of fruit chips Kris had always forced him to buy and crying over the onslaught of memories the one apple chip shaped like a wonky heart had brought. It looked just like the chip Kris had given him one night during a fit of cheesiness. Tao had already spent his third day in solitude ripping up the few printed pictures he had of Kris and when simply deleting the ones in all his electronic devices wasn’t good enough he printed out all the pictures of Kris he could get his hands on and defiled them with markers, scissors and the occasional trash can fire. The fourth day was spent crying over the wonky heart chip and mourning the loss of his precious memories. The fifth day was spent feeling angry all over again. This time he was angry at himself for falling for such an and punished himself by doing an obscene amount of pushups and then hitting his punching bag imagining it was his own face…he quickly realized it was more productive to imagine Kris’ face and did just that…for nearly three hours. He fell asleep that night exhausted and completely drained emotionally. The emotional emptiness carried on until the next day which Tao spent writing poems about emptiness in his weibo and not publishing them. His mum and dad had accounts (thanks to his stupid cousin) and he wouldn’t want to worry them with his depression.

Tao paused as he thought that word. Depression, is that what this was? He had always thought depression was about being lethargic and tired all the time. It was only feeling sadness, while Tao’s emotions had been all over the map. He had even had a moment of pure joy at one point at the thought that he never had to spend hours watching basketball games on the TV against his will. It was short-lived joy, but it had been joy. Tao looked up the symptoms of depression as he sipped mindlessly on a cup of weird tea, something he usually reserved for his old roommate Suho. It tasted weirdly fruity but it was all he had.

Tao read through the symptoms and personal testimonies online and decided that what he was going through sounded much too like depression and that he needed to do something about it. He needed help; he couldn’t get through this on his own.

Tao had spent most of his life being babied by the people around him. His parents and grandparents had always babied him. No, he wasn’t spoiled, he had always worked hard for the nice things he received, but his every emotional need was always catered to and addressed. He was never wanting of any hugs and kisses or kind words growing up, and had a lot of friends and pets to keep him company. When he came to Korea, on his own, his first year of high school he had his placement family to take care of him quickly becoming best friends with their son Jongin. Jongin was his rock for four years. Being a year older than Kai, Tao thought he’d be on his own for at least his first year of university but then he met Kris on a freshman tour and had quickly fell into a whirlwind romance. That day Tao had found another person to baby him and take care of his every emotional need in Kris.

Except, now that he had been abandoned by the person who had promised to be there for him for all eternity, he needed his rock. He needed his Jongie.

Jongin was staying in the dorms on campus, due to his laziness when it came to getting up in the mornings and his late night dance practices it made sense for him to stay on campus while Tao who preferred the big workout spaces offered by apartments chose to live off campus. Their apartments weren’t far from each other though, and Jongin was at his home within moments of getting a very distressing phone call from Tao.

Jongin swore Tao was being murdered with how much sobbing he had heard on the other end.

“Tao,” Jongin called as he barged into the apartment carrying an overnight bag filled with PJs and a bunch of junk food. He heard sobbing from the bedroom and rushed through the apartment kicking his shoes at the door to close it and forgoing slippers in order to get to his friend faster.

Jongin was meant with the sight of a rumpled, sobbing mess that was Tao and felt his heart break for the boy. He had his suspicions when he had seen Kris walking around campus sans Tao and with a pretty girl. His suspicions were clearly right. Only one thing could make Tao sob like this.

“That broke your heart,” Jongin growled rushing to pull Tao into his embrace. It wasn’t a question.

“Jongie, he left m-ee~!” Tao cried. “All because I’m not a girl and can’t give him babies!”

Jongin grit his teeth, that freaking bastard. He knew from the first time Tao had confided in him about Kris’ fear of coming out that this is how it would end. It sounded cruel, even to Jongin but he had envisioned this exact scenario so many times but couldn’t warn his baby Hyung because it meant the beautiful smile Tao wore in the ’s present would go away.  He had seen too many relationships, gay straight and alike, crack under the pressure of disapproving parents to hope for anything different. However, now that the day had come Jongin had no idea what to do.

“Oh peaches, it’ll be alright,” Jongin comforted. Usually their relationship consisted of insults, hitting and compliments in the form of teasing. Rarely did Jongin find himself being a relationship coach. Tao had never had any real problems with boyfriends always so confident and sure of himself.

“No Jongin, it won’t be. I am so stupid. I never should have fallen for a guy who couldn’t even admit he loved me without scanning the room to make sure no one heard him.”

“Wait what?”

Tao just shook his head. That was a story for another time.

“Tao,” he sighed. “I know it hurts now but you are a strong person. Things like this aren’t supposed to stop you from living your life. You are Huang Zitao, wushu master who can beat anyone and anything into submission, including a broken heart.”

“It’s not that easy Jongie. Kris was my life.”

“Oh no, you don’t,” Jongin growled grabbing Tao’s face so that he met his gaze. “You will not let this guy get you down. It hurts, yes; it’ll hurt for a long time. However, you cannot just stop living because you are worth so much more than he is. You owe it to yourself to keep on living a rich and fulfilling life.”

Tao sniffled looking at Jongin hopefully, “You really think so?”

“I know so.”

Tao smiled, fresh tears spilling over but so much calmer. He pulled Jongin into a hug. “Did I ever tell you how much of an amazing dongsaeng you are?”

“Yes, but I never get tired of hearing it,” Jongin teased.

Tao scoffed, “Well this is the last time I compliment you. Your head is enormous as it is.”

“Hey!” Jongin protested.

Tao chuckled weakly, still sad but much better now that Jongin was there. “How’d you get so good at this Hm?”

“One too many soppy movies with Kyungsoo Hyung,” he grumbled.

“I like Kyungsoo-ah he’s good to you…” Tao mumbled. He honestly loved how Kyungsoo was so great with Jongin. “His…his family knows right?”

Jongin tensed. “Yes, he told them he was gay when he was young. I met them last month remember?”

“Oh yeah…” Tao remembered now. He had been so jealous that Jongin met his boyfriend’s parents after dating a few months when his boyfriend’s mum didn’t even know he existed after two years. Now, he supposed she never would.

“I brought the emergency kit.” Jongin said offhandedly. “I even traded the horror movies to Disney ones just for you.”

Tao giggled, “For me? Don’t you mean for you?”

“You, definitely you,” Kai blushed.

“Uh-huh,” Tao rolled his red-rimmed eyes. “You go out and set it up; I’m going to have a quick shower.”

“Good idea Hyung, you stink!”

Tao flung a pillow at his friend’s retreating back already feeling better.

In the living room, Kai was setting up Tao’s laptop to his TV when he saw the stack of horror films on the table and a ghost movie in the player still. Tao hated those movies with a passion. He was always so scared he’d stay up with nightmares for weeks.

Tao and Jongin had spent the rest of the night eating cotton candy from a bucket (“this is so not as good as the type at carnivals!” Tao had muttered before eating three quarters of it) and watching happy Disney movies. Jongin had chosen his favourite Lady and the Tramp (“maybe I should get Monggu a girlfriend?”) and Tao had laughed his way through Nemo and the Princess and the Frog before relenting and allowing Kai to put on a few episodes of Pororo.

Tao had fallen asleep on Kai’s shoulder so they spent the night on the couch neither caring when the sun had spilled into the room the next morning to disturb their sleep (at least not too much) just enjoying each other’s company. They had missed spending time like this together too much to care.

Jongin had to leave early. He had to go solve some issues with the financial office (“They ‘lost’ my first payment the s; if they really lost it would it be shown as paid on the student website, idiots all of them!”). He had promised to come back and they would go out to dinner to celebrate class starting tomorrow (“more like mourn the end of freedom!”).

Tao had sighed at the reminder of classes starting tomorrow. He had only one lecture on Mondays, which he couldn’t fit in another day for the life of him, but it was still daunting having things to do in this state. At least he would have zero chance of running into Kris in any of his lectures, Kris being in his last year here as a Fourth year trying to earn his teacher’s degree and Tao only being in his second.

His Monday lecture wasn’t until 10 but Tao had gotten up early out of habit. Usually he would go for a run or maybe meet someone for breakfast on these days but it just wasn’t worth the energy to Tao at this point.

Jongin’s visit had done a lot towards cheering him up but his whole life had just suddenly changed in the span of a few hours. His whole routine, his whole life had revolved around Kris and Kris’ schedule, which in hindsight probably wasn’t healthy, but it wasn’t as if Kris didn’t do it as well.

Now though…now the day planner in his head was riddled with big fat questions marks.

Tao took an extra-long shower to try to waste time when something suddenly hit him. He had no one to take over Suho’s other half of the lease. He had been relying so much on Kris moving in that he hadn’t even thought to put out an ad during the summer when everyone would be looking for a place to live. Now the new semester was starting and everyone had probably already found a place and Tao was so screwed.

Tao placed flyers all over the place on his way to his lecture. In student services, in the financial office as well as outside the offices of several of the teachers he knew to have a steady stream of student appointments.

He was so desperate he had ended up needing to rush in order to make it to his lecture. He was on his way down the hall a few doors from his lecture when it happened. He suddenly ran into someone, which sent his flyers everywhere.

“Oh man, I am so sorry,” the other person most likely male said. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.”

“No problem,” Tao responded not very angry. This had happened to him a number of times and it would be so hypercritical to hold it against the guy, especially one so good looking.

Wait, good looking? Tao did a double take freezing when he took in the other man’s features. Damn, if Tao wasn’t currently nursing a broken heart he’d be all over that guy. He had brown fluffy hair that looked cute and innocent on anyone else but made him look like on legs. He also seemed tall, his twinky limbs giving him away. The frown on his face hardly took away from his looks, instead adding cuteness to him.

Tao never even noticed the other person staring at him just as hard as he stood taking the flyers his companion had helped him pick up mechanically.

“Thanks,” Tao finally stuttered as he caught sight of a student running into his classroom reminding him of where he needed to be.

“No problem,” even the guy’s voice was nice Tao whined internally. Why couldn’t he have met this person two years earlier? Tao realized the part of the brain that made rebound relationships sound good was talking and if he didn’t get out of there quick he’d be sorry.

“Right sorry, I have to go,” Tao called as he rushed passed the other. “Thank you for helping!”

“What was that?” Tao’s seatmate asked.

“What?” Tao looked to Baekhyun one of his ‘friends’ aka the person he’d sit with and do group projects with when they were in the same class but never really hung out with one on one.

“That, in the hallway, it looked like you were filming a cheesy K-drama out there.”

It took a moment but Tao finally understood, realizing Baek was the one he had seen running towards the lecture hall.

“You two were practically eye-ing each other. I thought you were dating Kris?”

Tao in a quick breath feeling like the air had been knocked out of him. He was dreading this part, slowly breaking the news to his friends and acquaintances. “We…we broke up.”

“Whoa, no ing way,” Baekhyun gasped dramatically. “You two have been together for ages.”

“Almost two years,” Tao bit out bitterly not mad at Baekhyun but residual anger at Kris taking over.

“What the hell man, I thought you’d guys would last forever…since when?”

“Last week,” Tao mumbled drawing squiggly lines in the corner of a post-it-note.

“Really, Chanyeol and I have been with him all week and-oh. Oh. Oh man, ing no way, why me?”

“What? Why you what,” Tao asked as Baekhyun started freaking out.

“It makes so much sense. Oh I should have seen it.”

“Seen what?” Tao urged.

“Kris…he’s been spending so much time with her, and she’s been so much happier looking I just thought you were visiting your family still and…wow. I really don’t want to be the one to tell you. I mean it’s always me, and I at tears man, I can’t deal with crying people-!”

“For god’s sake Baek what the hell,” Tao whispered sternly pinching the rambling man.

Baekhyun sighed as if the weight of the world had been placed upon him with his newfound knowledge. “I think…I’m almost positive that Kris is…dating Jung Jessica now.”