Hello~! Omo, I just saw today that it was a month ago that I updated :O sorry~! :( I will try to update more frequently, enjoy this chapter and please leave a comment ^^

Chapter 2 

I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all the kinds of things you can’t see from the center. 

-Kurt Vonnegut 

“Here’s your cappuccino” Sehun mutters before Luhan can even reach the counter and Luhan raises a surprised eyebrow at him. Sehun doesn't look at him as he puts the cappuccino on the counter and afterwards he quickly turns away to whip something of the coffee machine. Luhan send a questioning glance towards one of Sehun's co-workers but she simply shrugs before hurrying towards an uncleansed table. 

 “You look like you’ve had a bad day” Luhan comments carefully and tries a smile. Sehun snorts without looking up. 

“The worst” He confirms and throws his rag to the side. Luhan weighs pros and cons for a minute and wets his lips before speaking 

“Want to sit down and talk to me about it?” He asks lowly and makes sure to sound sincere and not to flirty. It seems to work because Sehun pauses his work and give him a short look before he looks down once again. Luhan doesn't know why this is all making him so nervous (he has been rejected multiple times, why should this be any different?) but his heart doesn't seem to listen and it's thumping violently in his chest. 

"Guess it couldn't hurt" Sehun mutters before looking up at Luhan with hard eyes. "But if you try to turn this into some freaking therapy session I will leave faster than you can blink" 

Luhan laughs at that and tries to ignore the uncomfortable twist in his stomach at the word "therapist". His heart does a funny little dance in his chest and he furiously hopes that he doesn't blush too much as he smiles at Sehun, who smiles back uncertainly. 

“Don’t worry, I at playing a therapist” Luhan assures and forces aside his sudden nervousness. He will not act pathetic.  

A little voice inside his brain is bugging him about how he doesn’t have time for this, how he should be doing homework right now instead of talking to Sehun but Luhan ignores it as he follows Sehun to a table. 

Sehun is kind of nice to talk to even if he is quite rude sometimes and doesn't seem too happy during the conversation. Luhan takes every little smile as a victory and he finds himself relaxing more than he thought he would. Sehun is surprisingly willing to talk about himself and Luhan gets to know a lot about him. Like that he hates chemistry but thinks math is fun. That he wants to work as an engineer or a physics teacher when he grows up but that he's also really interested in politics. 

"This society is corrupt" He states with a frown. "The rich get everything and the poor nothing. Everything cost money and even if you have a good brain and an ambitious you need to slave like an animal if you don't have the money. if you're fortunate you don't need to work even half as much" Luhan tries to agree with this but Sehun only sneers at him and talks about how he's a rich kid that doesn't understand. It's borderline offensive but Luhan decides to just let it go. He is a rich kid after all so Sehun is partly right but his parents money doesn't make him unable to see the obvious problems in society. 

The time when Luhan have to go to soccer practice approaches too fast and Luhan is actually sad when he has to leave. Sehun smiles and waves him off and Luhan is in a really good mood as he leaves the café. 

His good mood doesn't last long. 

Soccer practice goes bad.  

The breath in Luhan's lungs clog up and he feel more tired than usual. His brain feels cloudy and he feel physically sick, like he's on the brink of throwing up. But he doesn't, instead the feeling is there with every step he takes and he swallow with a dry throat since he's too afraid that he'll vomit if he drinks a lot of water. He can feel his muscles scream and mind struggling to focus as they run lap after lap around the field. 

They have had a lot of hard practices and maybe this is to expect but Luhan refuses to admit defeat as he stumbles forward on the field. No one else seems to have this kind of problem and Luhan can feel the underlying, all-too-familiar hopelessness settle in his chest. 

Why is he always so different?  

So useless? 

Minseok and his coach are the only ones to notice that something are wrong. 

"Are you ok?" Minseok asks half way in to practice and give Luhan a worried look. "You seem pretty out of it today" 

"I'm fine" Luhan assures with a smile. "Just a little bit tired." 

It's not a complete lie. Luhan is actually very tired. But maybe a more correct sentence would have been "I'm exhausted" because that's how he's really feeling.  

The coach takes him to the side after practice and asks if he want to  take a break the next day but Luhan declines. He doesn't want to seem weak. He knows that his position as a team captain is far from secure, with Minseok as a strong candidate to take his place, and Luhan can't afford any slip-ups. It's not that he doesn't think Minseok would be a good captain and he doesn't despise his friend in anyway, it's just that he needs this position. If he isn't team captain his parents will deem soccer as a waste of time and take him off the team and he can't let that happen. Soccer is the only thing he really enjoy doing and he can't loose it. So he brushes of his coach worries with a smile and some happy words. His coach doesn't look certain but soon Luhan's charm convince him and they part with smiles. 

What do you do when the only thing destroying you is yourself? 

It's just a panic attack Luhan desperately tries to tell himself. It's just a panic attack and he has had a hundred attacks like these before. It's common occurrence and he'll be fine. 

But sometimes these "comforting", "calm" words doesn't help and the pressure in Luhan's throat is building up, cutting off his air supply. He can feel his heart accelerate as it starts to run out of oxygen and his chest clench as all positive thoughts slowly drowns in panic. 

He tries to remember his breathing exercises but he draws a blank which only makes him panic even more. He claws on his desktop, making a mess and throwing his textbook on the floor as he searches for his phone. He finds it under a pile of papers and clutches it in his hand as he sinks off the chair and onto the floor. 

He got Joonmyun on speed dial. 

Because Joonmyun always knows what to do and he always answers because Luhan had asked his best friend to always keep his phone close and begged him always to answer. 

He curls into a fetal position on the floor, waves of panic pouring over him. The dialing tone sounds distant but Luhan hangs onto it like a lifeline. 

It goes past the standard three beeps it takes for Joonmyun to answer. It goes past six which is the longest Luhan has ever had to wait. 

"Hello this is Kim Joonmyun. Unfortunately I can't answer right now but please leave a message after the tone and I will get back to you as soon as possible. Bye!" 

Luhan's heart clench impossibly tight and his vision swims. 

Joonmyun always answers, he promised that he would. He said that no one would ever... 

Jongdae. 

It's the same that happened to Chanyeol when he got Baekhyun. Kyungsoo when he got Jongin. Minseok when he got Kris. It's what always happens. Before he had all of them on speed dial and he could always trust them. 

Seems like those days are over. 

Luhan screams. 

He screams and screams and screams and cough for air and let the panic take over. No one can hear him, his house is big, the walls sound proof and nobody is home. He's all alone. His vision swims and dims until it completely blackens out and the last thing he hears before he faints is the faint sound of a cellphone ringing. 

A little too late. 

When Luhan wakes up he got four missed calls from Joonmyun and three from Jongdae. Chanyeol, Kyungsoo, Jongin and Barkhyun have all tried to call him and he has several text messages on his phone, each a little bit more paniced than before. 

Luhan calls them all back, laughs and says that he only needed Joonmyun to tell him what they have for math homework and then he fell asleep. 

"You all need to stop worrying so much!" He exclaims, voice happy and unworried. 

Joonmyun apologizes a million times and says that he just couldn't hear the phone ringing while he and Jongdae watched a movie. Luhan assures him that it's fine, that he understands and that Joonmyun should go back to his boyfriend. 

Afterwards he deletes Joonmyun from his speed dial and stares for too long at the now blank, black list.