► Before anything else, I would like to say another thank you to everyone who has been and continue to support this story and me as the writer. Know it is all very much appreciated. Like said, I don’t know how else to express my gratitude but with numerous thank yous and through my stories – so be warned that you might get tired of reading these kinds of similar ‘thank you’ posts lol. Also, like I mentioned in the previous post, this will be the last post – for now – due to personal reasons. (For anyone interested, prolly none but still sharing hahah. It’s been going good! I am able to sleep now as opposed to the constant sleepless nights where I only get to fall asleep by like.. 5 to 6am then wake up two hours later lol orz). On another note, I hope, that when I return, you’d all still be here waiting and reading; although I don’t wish to hold you if you’ve lost interest since I don’t know when I’ll be back. But still – much love from me ♥ Let’s all hope it won’t be too long by then >u< Pray for me to get better and be able to get back soon! Yeh! *dances shameless in a hidden corner*

♥ exocholic

Now, without further ado, I hope you enjoy this chapter just as the rest – leaving you guys with a pretty long one :)

!! Note: »» ♠♠♠ «« - means a complete change of scene that is happening at the same time at a difference place.

7k

Today’s morning is greeted with the slowly clearing sky. No more the strong rain of last night, nor the loud sounds of thunder, nor the seconds’ brightness of lightning. The sky was still overcast, but no longer with thick clouds. The sunlight’s rays were still absent, but the brightness of the day was enough. The city was back to its morning dull state – gloomy air still lingering due to the passing weather.

That is the sight Baekhyun woke up to after a painful yesterday.

This morning, he wakes up alone in bed. The faint sounds of cutlery tingling in the kitchen the only sounds heard – Chanyeol must be preparing for breakfast. For the whole duration that Chanyeol is not beside him, Baekhyun lays listless in bed, feeling lonelier than ever. Chanyeol’s doll lookalike that usually kept him company was lying forgotten by the couch just across. He doesn’t move, just stays as is – lying sideways while looking out the window – mind in a state of blankness.

After quite some time, after preparing breakfast, Chanyeol too stands idle by the doorway, resting against the doorframe with arms crossed in his middle, quietly watching his lover watch the scenery outside.

Yesterday was too eventful for the two lovers that today’s morning, they simply forget – purposely pushing away all painful thoughts of yesterday in fear of the pain returning. But if Baekhyun was in a state of blankness, Chanyeol was in a state of uncertainty.

Today, Chanyeol is meeting Yejin, his ex-girlfriend. Today is the day Chanyeol will finally end things, a closure he long needed – to finally let go. But Baekhyun has yet to know, and in that, he is afraid of telling him and how to tell him.

Approaching the bed silently, Chanyeol’s heart begins to beat faster per every step. And gathering the courage he had been building up since he woke up, he proceeds to sit just beside his lover by the edge. No morning greeting was said vocally this time; instead, a silent greeting is made.

Placing a hand over Baekhyun’s hip, Chanyeol waits for the other to turn to him. In turn, Baekhyun looks at him and greets him with a lazy smile that nonetheless eases Chanyeol’s nerves a little. He mouths a silent hey that widens Baekhyun’s smile to a brighter grin.

Sitting up, Baekhyun taps his lover’s lips playfully – with one finger first then two – one tap, another, and a last; an act that had Chanyeol’s smile equally brightening. It was Baekhyun’s own silent way of greeting good morning – a tap for every syllable.

In response, Chanyeol follows suit, copying Baekhyun in his own way. He brings two of his lover’s fingers to his lips – the index and the middle; kissing both at the same time – one kiss, another, and a last. Then he moves them to tap Baekhyun’s own lips in the same rhythm but adding four more. Good morning to you too, love.

Delighted by their playful way of greeting, Baekhyun bursts into peals of laughter. Lunging in to embrace him and leaving an actual kiss to his lips, which Chanyeol more than welcomes and reciprocates.

But their playfulness ends soon, when Baekhyun pulls away and notices the way Chanyeol looked at him – a faint smile and solemn eyes. From then, he can tell that he had something bothering him.

The slow falter of Baekhyun’s smile and the shine in his eyes turning dim with wonder as he looked back, Chanyeol knew he had read him. For a moment, he admires Baekhyun’s ability to read him without needing words; something no one has ever been able to do before.

He is not sure if it is because their feelings for each other goes beyond simple romantic love that they are able to read one another without the use of words, or Baekhyun was just simply amazing and he had taught Chanyeol in the process.

With a tilt of Baekhyun’s head in a silent question, Chanyeol first leaves a chaste kiss to the corner of his lips – a little attempt to ease his thumping heart.

“I have something I need to tell you.” He starts. Baekhyun remains silent, waiting.

Silently breathing in to gather the last bit of courage, and breathing out to calm himself of the inevitable, Chanyeol holds both of Baekhyun’s hands.

“I’m meeting Yejin today.”

In an instant, he saw fear flash through Baekhyun’s eyes. With the unuttered question of why lingering in the air, he proceeds to explain.

“I know it may be too much to ask, but I ask you understand that I need this. I need to talk her, Baekhyun. It’s a talk I’ve been meaning to have ever since we broke up.” He says slow and gentle, but the resolve in his eyes final.

“I assure you that I have no intentions of returning to her or asking her back, none of that at all. This is all a friendly meeting, no more, no less.”

The grips on his hands tighten and the jealousy in Baekhyun’s eyes flicker.

“You have nothing to be afraid of, okay?” Chanyeol continuously assures him, rubbing gently his hands but squeezing them to get his point across. “I just need to end things once and for all.”

“Must you really?” Baekhyun finally speaks, a break in his voice. “Must you really meet her?”

The fear in Baekhyun’s eyes was evident that it pained Chanyeol in regret of telling of him. He probably should have not. But he can’t, Baekhyun must know for he won’t lie to him. It also pained him because is Baekhyun doubting him? To have this look of fear as if afraid he might lose him entirely after.

“Listen to me?” He said softly, waiting for some time to pass that eventually had Baekhyun loosening his grip on his hands but also lowering his head avoiding his eyes.

“You know what I’ve been through after the break up, right? How indifferent I was. How much I had no care for everyone around me. How broken I was then. And you also know the reasons, don’t you? Yura said she explained them to you.”

Baekhyun starts fidgeting his hands on his lap, continuously avoiding his eyes but nonetheless nods in answer.

“I still have a lot questions unanswered. Why she did that, for what reason, why she left me. Why she left all too abruptly without even leaving an explanation. If everything we had was all.. make believe and one sided.”

Chanyeol places two fingers under Baekhyun’s chin, tilting it up gently to face him. When Baekhyun looks at him, he graces him with a loving smile; faint but sincere.

“I don’t want to continue just loving you when I still have all these questions from the past. I don’t want to simply love you when the past is still bothering me – haunting me. I want to love you as a whole.” 

He brushes away stray hairs off his lover’s face, running his hand through his soft locks fixing his messy bed hair that Baekhyun unconsciously leans into.

“I want to love you for everything you are worth. I want to give my all to you and I can’t do that when I’m not yet at peace. Having these questions in me, I can’t help but feel like I’m betraying you. For every why of the past is a can I in the future.”

He leaves fleeting touches from his face down to his neck – a soothing soft touch of palm over skin – easing Baekhyun’s troubles away for every lingering feeling.

“I don’t want to make the same mistakes I did to her, to you. Because I don’t want you to leave me like she left me.”

“I love you far too much I fear of making the same mistakes.”

Leaning in more to his touch, looking up at him with fear still apparent, Baekhyun nods – a silent understanding.

They embrace after, Baekhyun holding tight onto Chanyeol as if afraid to lose him even after he had assured him. On the other hand, Chanyeol simply smiles in his embrace – to at least know that Baekhyun is afraid to lose him equally, assures him that he is not alone. It is not only him who fears the loss of the other.

Wrapped in Chanyeol’s warm embrace, Baekhyun remains quiet. Slightly assured by Chanyeol’s words but the fear and guilt continuously eating him.

Baekhyun is jealous – for something that hasn’t happened yet, he is. With an overthinking mind like his, it was inevitable to have random scenarios playing in his head. The what if’s plaguing his mind once again slowly crumbling him to pieces.

What if Chanyeol realizes that his love for Yejin had not gone away? They haven’t met for so long and the last time they saw each other, Chanyeol still loved her. Won’t meeting her now reignite those feelings?

What if Yejin tries to get Chanyeol back? She still loves him, and even though she had silently indirectly assured Baekhyun that she no longer had hope and that she was happy it was him.. won’t trying for the last time be tempting?

What if Yejin suffers from a slip of tongue and accidently tells Chanyeol the truth about him? Or what if Yejin intends to ruin them both? What if she wanted to help that she tells him on behalf of Baekhyun?

What if.. What if…..

What if?

Holding tighter onto Chanyeol, Baekhyun presses himself as close as he can ever be, unaware that he had climbed onto his lap. With the what if’s broiling in his mind enough to waken his anxiety, Baekhyun almost felt like crying. But as Chanyeol equally holds him tight in return, hearing and feeling his breath near his ear – he fights the doubts away.

No. Yejin is a good person. No matter what people say, no matter how much she is doubted, no matter what she did in the past – Yejin was the first to hold him tightly even after telling her his sad painful truth. An embrace that he knew and felt was everything sincere.

He thought of her dearly, their bonding may be short but his friendship with her is something he held importance to. And even if it pained him of the horrible things she did in the past – to Chanyeol and to their friends – he knew she regrets everything wholeheartedly. Their friendship blossomed with the anonymous knowledge of their pasts that both accepted without judgement. And that alone was important.

But the next attempt to assure himself instead breaks him for the nth time. All the more after Chanyeol pulled away to give him a smile – his sincere lovely eye smile that conveyed his love for him that instead brought heartache.

Chanyeol loves him. He had proven time and time again that he does. The promise of love he gave him way before he even asked him to be his. Chanyeol would never do such a thing. He would never leave him like he fears. But that is because Chanyeol trusts him, because he doesn’t know anything.. he doesn’t know the truth.

Ironic, is it not? How could he doubt Chanyeol when he himself is hiding something? How pathetically hypocritical of him to even think he has the right to doubt.

♠♠♠

For the remaining time they had together before Chanyeol had to leave, the routine remains the same. Although this time, Chanyeol is extra attentive to Baekhyun’s needs due to his still fairly fresh wounds. Something Baekhyun couldn’t help but think that Chanyeol watches him every second since he knew what he needs and wants despite not being vocal about it.

Like the time he wanted water and groaned raspy while rubbing his throat. But before he was even able to tell him, next thing he knew, a glass of water was being ed to him. Or the time he absently began rubbing the soles of his feet, careful but an attempt to lessen the itchiness; Chanyeol then immediately went on to check, doing the necessary steps Junmyeon had taught him the day before of taking care of it.

Also, to his utter embarrassment, all throughout, he was carried by Chanyeol. No matter how many times he protests or whines about it, Chanyeol always refuses him and without so much a word, carries him whenever and wherever needed.

Chanyeol need not say anything, but Baekhyun can tell that aside from the extra attention he’s getting due to his injury, it was also as if a way to make up to the inevitable meeting with his ex-girlfriend later on that he knew Baekhyun was still uncomfortable about.

Baekhyun need not say anything, but Chanyeol can tell that even if he had assured him and no matter how many times he was to, he knew that if Baekhyun had a choice, he wouldn’t let him go. It was only normal after all; that the fear he had won’t go away anytime soon. He wasn’t meeting just anyone. He was meeting his ex-girlfriend that Baekhyun knew he loved dearly back then.

All throughout, no kisses were made; only a simple peck to Baekhyun’s temple once and no more. For Chanyeol knew that no amount of physical attention he was willing to give Baekhyun was enough assurance, because even if he showered him with tight embraces and many kisses, Baekhyun’s mind would still be preoccupied with worry and anxiety. However, what amazes Chanyeol, is what actually distracts Baekhyun.

With a tight hold of his lover’s hand all throughout – fingers interlaced, with his thumb rubbing soothing circles – and the only time it separates is when it cannot be avoided. The most minimal act of affection, yet apparently powerful enough to send his message of assurance across that had Baekhyun gracing him with a smile every time. Love is indeed mysterious.

When it was time for Chanyeol to finally leave, no words were said. But his lover’s tight embrace was enough to tell him how afraid he is. This time, he kisses Baekhyun, pouring out all the love he can in the few seconds press of lips. He runs his hand one last time through his lover’s locks, and leaves another kiss to the corner of his lips conveying his unsaid words: he will return back to him.

Baekhyun is not able to see him out the door, but the look he gave him from afar before Chanyeol closes the front door leaves an aching painful feeling in his chest. Is he doing the right thing? Or is he making a big mistake?

♠♠♠

The sky still hadn’t cleared enough for the sun’s rays to pass through. It was still overcast by clouds, not bright but not dark either; however, enough to give the city a melancholic look. The city remains dull, and with how high up above they are, no movement of life is seen and enough to even make it gloomy – a contrary to the bright lively lights of the night.

For the next twenty minutes after Chanyeol’s leave, Baekhyun is left alone to muse in his thoughts – the fear and anxiety finally enveloping him whole in the emptiness of the whole penthouse. The deafening silence does not help either. He looks out the window and watches the scenery as if reflecting his own feelings. He feels numb but at the same time in pain – the fear of the truth confusing his senses. The lingering touches Chanyeol left and his kisses that he felt all love poured out sending him in even more pain of the guilt he felt.

But he is not able to muse any further, when the faint sounds of keys by the front door that he is able to hear even in a distance due to the silence disrupts his thoughts. Nervous, alerted, but also curious, Baekhyun watches as the door opens as if in slow motion; his thoughts wired and slowly turning frenzy of what he must do especially in the helpless weak state he is in at the moment.

But his pounding heart of fear – of many things mixed – turns into a craze of happiness as the person reveals himself.

“Minho hyung!!” Baekhyun shrieks and almost launches himself off the couch to run to him, but Minho was fast enough to stop him.

“DON’T!—move.” He halts Baekhyun with a hand th