He sat in his office chair and busied himself with the papers and letters that were already piling on the corner of his desk. Just the way he liked it.
He was the most organised man in the entire building and his boss practically kissed the floor he walked on. He didn't notice of course. He was too busy being, well, busy. He did all of his work without procrastinating, completing reports, research, or whatever was asked of him. He would do it well and he would do it quickly, and when that was sorted he turned to the papers and mail and sorted through it all in one go. There were two piles he would sort these into, documents of importance, and those destined for the trash.
He never stopped working. In fact, if he finished all of his daily work load, which he usually did, he would go straight to the boss and ask for more. In all of his time at the company he had never made even one spelling mistake and was scarily enthusiastic in his silent brooding way.  He was promoted before anyone could blink an eyelid.
Tonight he was working over time, as usual, and he loosened the top button of his crisp white shirt as he picked up the last letter. He sighed and put it into the trash bin, it was just another advertisement for a website he had no plans to sign up to. Finishing up he put on his suit jacket and turned the lights out in his office. Employees smiled and nodded at him as he passed, the women flirting uselessly and the men trying to invite him out to drink. He had carried out favours for all of these people at one time or another, finished their over-running work or helped them with new ideas. Everyone there loved him, the cool mysterious guy who turned up out of the blue two years ago, thin, tired, but a fantastic worker and undeniably gorgeous. His work had been consistent from the start and so had his personality. He worked flawlessly, he was distant, his emotions never showed and nobody ever really knew who he was.
How had he come to be here? Where had he come from? They had no idea of the event that had changed his life two years ago today. He left the building all by himself, climbed into his car all alone, entered his quiet, empty house, and all the while he couldn't help but remember once again.
It had started and ended with letters. Not like those in his office, but over four years worth of letters posted to the wrong address and then lazily shoved aside to be redirected at a later date.
He had been on the bridge that day, standing on the edge and raising himself to jump off. He had lost everybody, including himself. And then his love had stopped him and he was in turmoil all over again. Why would nobody let him live, yet nobody let him die. He seemed to be cursed and even now he was no better. He had created himself a life, a good job, a nice car, a decent house. But what was the use of materialistic desires if he was separated from the one he loved?
He had been angry that Lay stopped him from jumping that day, but at the same time he was glad that of all people it had been Lay. He took it as a sign, and yet he had still ran from his feelings, his guilt, his fear, his love. He was such a coward, he couldn't deny it to himself, so in a rage he had thrown his backpack down to the water, cursing at himself and  then running away from Lay. He felt a pang of guilt as he did so, but he just kept on running and didn't stop.
Blinking momentarily back to the present he placed his car keys in the bowl by the front door, closing the door behind him with a quiet click that momentarily resounded in the silence. The darkness consumed him as he moved through the house, not bothering to turn on any lights as he went. He couldn't be doing with that artificial glow that pained his eyes and highlighted the emptiness of his house. He draped his jacket over the arm of the sofa and lay down, one of his arms over his eyes as if he was trying to shut out a bright light. But it wasn't light causing this headache, it was the memories rushing through his mind like a gust of wind through an old, creaky building.
He was taken back two years into the past to the streets of Seoul, buildings flashing past him as he ran. He ran with tears stinging his eyes and a bad taste in his throat. All around him the buildings themselves were memories solidified. To the left was where he had first had coffee with Lay, and up ahead was where he had bought their rings. He turned away from them, taking a back alley. He was taken away from the main streets to grimy one-way roads and old warehouses. He turned again when he was outside of SM host club and kept going, passing JYP and running still. He stopped taking notice of where he was, he didn't want the reminders that his surroundings brought him. He let his feet take him away and kept going until there was no more oxygen in his lungs.
He stopped abruptly, taking quick sharp breaths and doubling over. As he in oxygen he became slowly aware of his surroundings again and noticed voices that he hadn't been aware of before. He moved closer to the sound, wondering who would stop to chat in streets like these.
"Look he doesn't live here anymore! Take them away."
"But they've been delivered to this address, do you not know where he lives now?"
"I evicted him and that's the last I heard of him. He hasn't been around for months."
Kris looked up and saw his old apartment buildings. Of course, this had been a route he'd taken frequently in the past, it was only natural that his feet should take him this way again. He caught his breath and went to silently pass by but was noticed by the two men.
"Wait." He heard one of them say, it was the landlord. "That's him! Unbelievable." The voice turned to him. "Wu Yifan?" Kris froze. Nobody had called him that in years.
He turned slowly and his old landlord jogged over. "You're my old tenant, aren't you?"
Kris nodded slowly and followed numbly as he was led to the front of the building. He had no idea what was going on. He reached the other man who nodded in greeting before beginning to speak.
"Um. I have some mail for you, I believe it was all being sent to the wrong address, it has only just been forwarded to this address." The postman gestured to the apartments.
Kris looked at the small pile of letters and took one from the top. Wu Yifan was written on the envelope in Chinese, but most startlingly of all it was the hand writing that grabbed his attention.
He had no way of carrying all of these letters and he regretting losing his temper and throwing his backpack. That backpack had held the last of his belongings and yet there was still space inside for these letters. Thankfully the tenant lent him a cardboard box and he carried the letters to a park bench a few streets away, wishing to read through them properly and in private. The park had seen better days, the playground was rusty and covered in graffiti, the grass was turning brown and in some places was completely churned up, leaving only mud behind. Litter blew along in the breeze and the bushes were lined with old fading cans that had once contained cheap alcohol.
He opened the letters one by one and with each one he felt his heart lurch, tears beginning to form in his eyes. The end of each letter was the same. "My new address is on the back. I hope to see you soon. I love you, please forgive me."
He needed to get to China. Straight away. But he had no passport and no money. He took for the docks and managed to sneak himself into a ship container heading straight for China, he had limited food and water, only what he had been able to secretly steal. The journey ahead was long, and it would be the most difficult weeks of his life yet.
The memory faded and he returned to his living room. Breathing heavily he sat up and unscrewed a bottle of water. After rustling through his pockets he produce a small bottle of sleeping pills and emptied two into his hand, swallowing them down with water and then returning to laying on his sofa.

~ Two years ago, South Korea ~

Lay had been silent and depressed for days and Joonmyeon didn't know what to do to make him better. He too had felt bad, though he hadn't really known Kris but even still, Kris had always had a kind of presence that hung around even long after he was gone. He suddenly stopped as a memory flashed through his mind. He couldn't believe that he had forgotten all of this time, although to be fair he had been rather preoccupied.
"Lay." Joonmyeon said slowly, obviously thinking carefully about how to approach the subject. Lay noticed a strange tone in Joonmyeon's voice and it caught him off guard, sensing that what Joonmyeon was about to was  going to say would stray into painful territory.
"What is it?" Lay asked, feeling slightly paranoid.
"I have something I want to do, and I'm going to need your help. Do you think you'll be able to do that?"
"What is it?" Lay asked warily.
After delaying for a few seconds Joonmyeon revealed his plans to Lay, throwing caution to the wind. "I want to track down Kris's mother."
Lay hadn't been expecting that, but agreed nonetheless. It gave him a new spark, a new reason to live. So later that very same day Lay and Joonmyeon were already at work. Lay was willing to tell Joonmyeon anything that would help, but Joonmyeon found Lay's enthusiasm disturbing. It was as if Lay though finding out about Kris and tracking down his mother would bring Kris back. He hadn't the heart to say anything and hoped that maybe finding Kris's mother would bring some closure to Lay. Maybe then he would be able to move on and Joonmyeon would finally be able to restore happiness to Lay.
Joonmyeon refocused on the task and read the sheet in his hands. He almost dismissed it at first, but some sort of instinct kicked in at the last second.
"Look at this." Joonmyeon said, ing around a sheet of paper they had retrieved from SM host club. They were sitting in Tao's living room, all of the papers from the case reguarding Kris were littered across the coffee table. Sehun ate sweets and didn't really have any input on the task, he had never really been the one to have an input on anything. On the other hand once Tao had heard of Joonmyeon's plan he, like Lay, had been enthusiastic to take part.
"What does it say?" Tao asked curiously, moving his attention to Joonmyeon.
Joonmyeon didn't answer Tao, he instead asked his own question."Lay do you remember filling in your form for SM?"
"Kind of... Kris filled mine for me." He admitted. "Although Kris did ask me question as he did it."
"Do you remember being asked to supply your real name and an alias?" Suho inquired.
Lay nodded. For a second everyone waited for Joonmyeon to get to the point, but then Tao and Lay realised what Joonmyeon was getting at at the same time.
"Kris was his alias?!" Tao gasped, it was not a question but asking for confirmation from what he had already guessed.
"It seems like it. His name here is written in Chinese. However on Lay's form and the rest of his own he had used hangul, it's curious."
"So we need to search using real name, not his alias." Lay said, then hesitated before continuing. "What was his real name?"
He passed the sheet to Lay, unable to read the Chinese characters.
Lay seemed to smile sadly before speaking. "Wu Yifan."
Using Tao's and Suho's combined skills it wasn't long before they tracked down a woman who fit his mother's description. She'd had a son named Wu Yifan on November 6th 1990 and had lived in the same area that Kris had described to Lay.
"I think she's our best bet. We should get a flight over and ask to speak with her." Joonmyeon said.
"Also..." Lay said quietly. "The money that Kris won in the case. If she is his mother, she should have it."
They agreed on a date, flights were booked and only days later they were in China knocking at the address that they were able to obtain after a little more research.
Joonmyeon was of little use in China, and Tao was nominated to be the main speaker. A woman opened the door, and Lay didn't know what he had been expecting but the woman in front of him was not what he would have imagined. She was tall and fairly stylish and if you looked past her age you noticed that she could easily have been a model in her youth. It was clear to see where Kris got his good looks from.
"We're terribly sorry to bother you out of the blue like this, but I was wondering if you know who this person is." Tao said, holding up the only picture of Kris that he had, an employee photograph taken for the host club booking register. The woman gasped and looked closer at the picture.
She seemed unable to look away, as if she had just regained her sight after years of being blind. She stared, captivated, until  suddenly she seemed to remember the crowd before her and looked up.
"That's my son." She said, tears welling in her eyes. "Do you know my son?" She looked across the small crowd of young men standing at her door step.
"Do you mind if we come in?" Tao asked. "We'll be able to talk more comfortably there." She nodded and held the door open for them. Once seated inside with a glass of water clasped in their hands they began to explain the situation.
"We knew your son. Kris moved to Korea over a year ago." Tao began, but was interrupted.
"I'm sorry, but did you say Kris? Is that what he's been calling himself over there?" She smiled knowingly, as if she expected nothing less of her son.
"Yes sorry, I probably should have explained. I only found out that his name was really Yifan just days ago."
"It's no problem at all. He always did want a more Western name. Please continue."
Tao explained the story from start to end. How Kris had gone to live at his Father's, but returned to China a few years later. He had been unable to find his mother and turned to Korea, hoping to follow his dream to become an idol. Instead he ended up in the host club where he was subjected to slave-like conditions. Tao went on to say about the court case that had followed and the condition that Kris had ended up in, including the counseling that he had been receiving.
He broke off, suddenly feeling unable to continue. His throat felt constricted and he noticed that Lay had silently started to cry. His mother in silence, absorbing the information and trying to comprehend how her son could have gone through all of that.
Finally she broke the silence. "So where is he now? Where's my boy? My son?" Despite her questions she seemed to already know the outcome. Soft tears streamed down her face.
"Kris, no,  Yifan was unable to cope with the guilt he'd been feeling and the situation he was in. After Lay spotted him on a bridge he followed Kr_ Yifan but the busy traffic blocked his view. Yifan's bag was found floating in the Han river. He hasn't been found since."
Kris's mother gave a small gasp and she cried into her hands. Lay's silent tears turned into sobs and the room became a place of mourning. Kris's mother broke down completely, unable to understand how such a fate could be bestowed on her son. Her son that she hadn't seen in all of these years. If she had just known...  No, she had sent letters. She had tried her best to find him. Nobody could be blamed.
When everybody had cried their last tear Joonmyeon nudged Tao.
"The court case." Tao started, his voice much weaker than before. "We won, and Soo Man has been locked away for a very long time." Tao ruffled through his briefcase and pulled out an envelope. "This is what Kris should have won." He handed the money to the woman who suddenly looked much older than before. She peered inside and her eyes widened at the amount, but no amount of money could replace the son that fate had taken from her.
They stayed for half an hour longer, then left for their hotel. The next morning they took the first flight back to Korea and started to slowly rebuild their lives.

Chapter one of the sequel! I'm so excited. Remember if you liked this then comment below, subscribe and upvote. Such simple tasks really do make my day.

New readers you will probably get confused, so before reading I suggest you read my first story Contract to Their Hearts. To my tier readers ;) ;) you may be interested in my BTOB oneshots.

I hope you enjoy reading this, a lot of planning, writting, deleting and rewritting has been going on. But it's finally here and I can start to finally get down and write some hella awesome chapters for you.

-1990stalker-