Chapter Four

Fools

Jeonghan feels stupid, Seungcheol doesn’t reply for two more days. He’s both terrified and angry. Terrified at the thought of Seungcheol wants to get rid of him becomes true and angry for himself of realizing that this friendship couldn’t go on if Seungcheol is the only one trying.

It’s sunday evening, his sister is not coming home until tomorrow morning and he’s all alone. He had finished his homework and he has nothing to do. He tried and tried to take his attention away from the phone , but he just couldn’t help to wish for a certain name to appear on the screen. Not for the actual person to actually appear on his doorway.

“Seungcheol, why are- what are you doing?”

His dark hair is all wet from the sweats, some of the perspirations are still dripping from his temple. White smoke rises from between his freezing lips.

“I want to see you too”

Jeonghan can feels himself burning despite the cold november air and the fact that Seungcheol is shamelessly blurting that words calmly only makes it worse. Seungcheol is now taking a bath in his bathroom, his backpack and wet clothes lie on the floor. Jeonghan goes to the kitchen just in case Seungcheol hasn’t had his lunch or already hungry for dinner. By the time Jeonghan finished making a simple omelet, Seungcheol comes out the bedroom fully clothed in a jog pants and a dinosaur print t-shirt. “Are you hungry?” and Seungcheol nods.

The feast is quiet, Jeonghan expect Seungcheol to start a conversation, but again, Jeonghan always the one expecting first. “So..how was the practice going?” It was dumb of him to repeat the same question from the previous text because now his cheeks are burning again. “Tiring, but i made it. Today is the last day of the training camp. We went to the mountain for a week”

“You went to a training camp?” Jeonghan couldn’t believe his ears

“It was really hard just to get one line on the signal sign” It is weird, because Jeonghan finds himself sighing in relief. Seungcheol is not avoiding him. “I was about to tell you once i arrived there, but i gave up since it’s really hard to get the signal”

“I’m glad”

And Seungcheol looks up, their eyes met for the first time after a full week of not seeing each other. “I- i mean i thought you’re mad and – and avo-avoiding me”

“I what?”

Seungcheol probably feeling like hearing the wrong things since Jeonghan says it out with too much stutters in one sentence. “You know i can’t get mad at you” Seungcheol laughs and Jeonghan hearts stop, he couldn’t hear the beating for a sudden. It’s weird.

“Can we watch the next part of the Titanic after this?” Jeonghan tries to change the topic, walking himself to the sink. “You haven’t watch it?”
“I thought we should watch it together”

Seungcheol puts his spoon down, leaning back on the chair to relax himself. “You could just watch it, i’ve watched it like five times already” Even so, They settle down on the same cramp couch on Jeonghan’s living room. The clock strikes seven in the evening while Jeonghan went to take a bath and Seungcheol make a call back home.

“That looks painful ” Jeonghan make a comment when Rose shows off her ballet move, standing on her toes when finally Jack catches her on his arms. Seungcheol can see Jeonghan cringes at the scene, maybe imagining what will happen if she couldn’t balance herself , if Jack didn’t catch her and slam her head on the floor instead. Rose is pulling Jack back on her room. They giggle as if it’s the funniest thing in the universe, to run hand in hand.

“Draw me like one of your french girls” Seungcheol says along the dialogue.

The version they show on TV doesn’t have the detail like on the CD, and the first time Seungcheol watch the uncensored version, his brother was there,next to him to laugh his of at Seungcheol’s flushed face. And so Seungcheol hoped to see it on Jeonghan.

But Jeonghan cries. Jeonghan is ing crying.

The crystal droplets fall slowly, trickling down his cheeks in a slow motion. Seungcheol is stunned. They’re watching a scene where Rose is posing on the couch and Jack is there watching her intensely, drawing her image on the rough paper, and Jeonghan is crying. His sniffle slips out when Jack finished his drawing, showing it to Rose. Jeonghan’s eyes still fixated on the screen, the tears dried off when the scene where they kissed and the ship met the iceberg. At this point, Seungcheol is not watching the movie anymore, his eyes are on Jeonghan, watching every single change on Jeonghan’s expression.

“He’s dead” The sounds almost come out like a whisper as Jack’s image slowly sinking down to the blue.

“Jeonghan” Seungcheol calls out.

And for the first time after the movie, Jeonghan met Seungcheol’s eyes, strangely closed right in front of him, and it’s just getting weirder because he can feel the warm lips on his.

Seungcheol is kissing me.

~~~

Just like any other Monday, Seungcheol wakes up as the alarm rings at 5 am. He is on his bed, sheet and blanket tangling in a mess. Last night is a tough battle to get himself drifts to dream, he ended up tossing around the bed, constantly blaming and cursing the innocent pillow. He slips out his pajama pants and puts on a training suit. Earphones hanging from both ears, covered in a black beanie and the hood of his Adidas jacket.
The jog is quiet and cold, just like it has always been. But Seungcheol enjoys it. Now that he’s old enough-according to his dad- to explore the neighborhood alone, he wouldn’t have to leave a ‘I’m going out’ sticky note on the fridge for his mom to see.

The playlist on his iphone keep him company. Until the ing Wild plays in his earphone. He stops, it was the song he plays the whole week of the training camp. He wasn’t a fan of some pop songs, he loves rap, screams, and some underground music with lost of electro touch. But this song, just lingers on his goodnight playlist, literally abusing his earphones. It was last Sunday, when they returned from visiting Mingyu. Seungcheol was confused, because Jeonghan seems to be awkward, he didn’t dare to say anything because he himself, was not sure. Monday came fast, ignoring the sleepless night Seungcheol had before. His bag was already sitting on his chair, and then he remembered , he had a training camp for a week. The members were clinging to the captain as he made his presence on the bus,

“What the are you guys doing ?”

“Taehyung told us, you had a date yesterday” The mentioned person whistled. Seungcheol was going to kill him but then he realized he hasn’t told Jenghan about his training. He was about to, but yesterday turns out to be kind of, unexpected. Wait, why would i tell Jeonghan?

Maybe Jeonghan doesn’t want to know

Next day, his mind and body were occupied by the harsh training. His body aches every time he lied down on the bed for the night. And again, when basketball is out of his mind, Jeonghan came back to claim his place on Seungcheol’s thought. The words were typed, but his finger is faster to erase it again. Maybe he should just call.

The number you are calling  cannot be reached

.

All his courage broke down, it’s fate. “Do you have anything that can make me sleep,Jiwon?”

The bunny point forward squinted his eyes. “Wanna hear some of chilling songs my sis just gave me?”

And so the album is now sitting on his playlist. It was supposed to help him sleep but the lyrics, damn lyrics, is echoing in his ears. Every words of the lyric is stimulating his brain to reenacting scene he wished -he prays and begs to God- to not coming up at this moment. He wished he’s not good in english himself, he wished he just misheard the lyrics, but no. He heard them right and the scene was still playing on his mind. There’s Jeonghan and their first meet, there’s Jeonghan and his silence, there’s Jeonghan and his quiet, there’s Jeonghan and his wounds, there’s Jeonghan and their promise, there’s Jeonghan and his shoulder length brunette, there’s jeonghan and his rice balls, there’s Jeonghan and his slender grips on his waist, and there’s Jeonghan and his ‘yes, just like me and your Seungcheol hyung’

Things about Jeonghan and his blablabla keep him away from sleep, even when he smashed the skip button to play his Linkin Park playlist, Jeonghan was still there. Seungcheol was more frustrated. By the time his body gave up to his mind and fell asleep, Seungcheol has to wake again -because it’s suddenly 5 am in the morning- only to find the inside his pajama pants. Seungcheol was late for morning jog, and the coach is not pleased.

Seungcheol redeemed his esteem as the captain with leading their team to victory in the join match later that afternoon. As soon as the sun sets, Seungcheol was facing the same problem as last night, same sleepless night and same in the morning. He came to a conclusion that he’s just ually frustrated, he had a hard training everyday and his puberty hormone just couldn’t catch up with his rationality.

That’s it.

But as he sat on the way home on the Sunday , his phone beeped.

I kinda want to see you

rationality. Seungcheol came down in front of Taehyung’s house. “You want to sleep over?” eyebrows raised at Seungcheol who is tailing behind Taehyung to come down.

“No,i gotta drop somewhere first” and Seungcheol run faster, taking a detour to the subway. He’s ed, he’s in front of Jeonghan’s door and he couldn’t knock. Just do it,Seungcheol.

And so it comes to this, this time he’s really ed. He kissed Jeonghan, with Rose crying on the background and Jack sinking to the bottom. The supposed to be nightout at jeonghan’s place was forcefully cancelled because Seungcheol ruined it, because Jeonghan was giving him a shocked face and Seungcheol has this urge to bury himself alive.

It’s official, he has no control of his hormone. He’s going to be dead.

~~~

The rest of the week is just not any better, Yifan brings along his super pretty girlfriend on the late fall family dinner. Mom is ecstatic, and dad is just as delight. Yoona is definitely Seungcheol’s living version of an angel. She’s beautiful, have a very enchanting smile, great attitude, stunning manners, and everything every man can wished for. They came all the way to home in between their busy days at the city. Yifan had started to work in a government’s field in the capital when he met Yoona, the daughter of his superior who happens to be a news announcer his father always talked about.

“You’ll be playing in the regional championship?”

Seungcheol snaps his mind back to the conversation. “Yes,all of us are really looking forward to this season”

“That’s amazing. Yifan always tells about Seungcheol’s game. I bet he’s as excited as Seungcheol” Yifan’s face beet red, mom’s laughing and dad couldn’t help to make a funny comment about his brother’s secret’s brotherly love. He likes Yoona, she’s fun. She even secretly helps him to wash the dish when his parents clearly wants Yoona to take a rest after the long trip. “It’s really okay. Mom will scold me if she knew”

Yoona laughs, he can understand why Yifan falls in love with her. “Then let’s take the scolding together”
“Yifan also tells me alot about you, he loves you, i bet my whole life on it” this time the pretty lady chuckles, carefully rinsing the glasses. “What do you know about love, young man?” her tone is rather playful this time. “I don’t know, but i suppose that’s what you call love when you think and care about someone all the time, right?”

“Then, is there any lucky girl you think and care about all this time, Seungcheol?”

Seungcheol is getting more frustrated because yes it is, he has someone, but he is certain that Jeonghan is not a girl. He is supposed to love a girl, that’s what boys do, fall in love with girls. He’s not sure if it’s love, but Jeonghan still lingers in his mind even after a full week of not seeing nor communicating with him. Seungcheol has come to a conclusion that he should avoid Jeonghan just to make sure whatever it is, it’s gonna disappear soon.

Later that night after dinner, Yifan knocks on his door asking if he had time to spend. Seungcheol is glad that nothing had changed between them even when their surroundings did. “I like her” Seungcheol confesses and Yifan is relief. “Then,tell me about your flaming crush and desire of the youth”

“I don’t have such thing as flaming crush and desire of the youth” Seungcheol chuckles. “No fun” Yifan plops his long arms and limbs out on the bed. “All right, let’s shift the topic a bit,is there any girl you like at the moment?”

“Nope”

“Anyone?”

Seungcheol shakes his head. “That’s weird. Then you must be doing it while watching ”

“Dude!” Seungcheol groans, so that’s what Yifan means when he asked about anyone he likes. “Seriously? is that what you are wondering all this time? How do i release my flaming crush and desire of the youth as you said it?”

Yifan is still laughing and it irks Seungcheol even more. Really, what a lovely brother. “Oh, Come on. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, we’re both guys and I’ve been in your shoes,so it’s normal for me to be concern about you-”

“-especially since you freaked out at your first wet dream-” smack. The pillow is supposed to land on Yifan’s laughing face instead of his shoulder though. “That’s not funny”

“Sorry,sorry” The older wipes his tears with the back of his hand. “anyway, not only me, but mom and dad are also concern about you since you barely tell us about your personal life’ s problem”

“I don’t have personal life’s problem”

“Really? then how do you explain that sour face of yours? Mom told me that you’ve been wearing it for the past weeks” Seungcheol knows everyone notice his troubled face. Especially his brother, but not a single person should know about Jeonghan. “I’m just worried about the exam and the game,i don’t want to disappoint anyone”

Yifan sighs, Seungcheol doesn’t know what that means, is he relief that it’s not something to worry about or is it because he knows Seungcheol is telling him a lie and he is disappointed at him. Seungcheol prefers the first option. “Mom also said you’ve been locking yourself in the house, she thought you have problem with your friends or something.”

“Sorry” he means it, for making everybody worry.

“It’s glad to hear that you’re okay, Just remember, if you ever need someone to talk to and help you, i’m here. always”

Thanks, brother.

~~~

Note :

Aaaah, I know it's ed up. I mean why the hell I made Seungcheol kiss Jeonghan like that!  Uhh, I don't know.

About the Titanic scene, actually I forgot most of the scene, and probably there are some mistakes about the dancing scene I write in here, I apologies guys >_<

And there's Yifan, Wu damn Yifan, I just love him and Seungcheol resembles him somehow (don't you think so??) that’s why I made him as Seungcheol’s brother. And also there yoona, the goddess Im I love with all my heart (I'm a Yoonkris shipper~) makes a minor appearance. 

And Oh Lord, some subscribes T_T I don’t know what to say,  I'll work harder to keep the story going! So thank you, and thank you 

With love,

Deerchoding