The next day, during lunch break, Woohyun announces the news to Hoya and Sungjong, absolutely giddy with excitement. He also breaks the news that he’s going to be sitting with Sungyeol for lunch from now on.

He doesn’t even consider the fact that Hoya and Sungjong are possibly, slightly, hurt by the fact that he’s simply dumping them aside for his new boyfriend. It’s not that they aren’t happy for him - they are, after all, they are his best friends - but somehow it seems as if this small act is going to dent their friendship. Hoya and Woohyun have the same major, so it’s easy for them to keep in touch. Sungjong, however, is a business major. The only reason he’s best friends with them is because he was the only other person in the university who had come from the same boarding school as Hoya. Still, they force smiles on their faces and with a ‘Congratulations! Best of luck!’ they send him off to the other end of the canteen.

Unfortunately, Sungjong and Hoya are right.

Gradually, the three friends drift apart. First, Woohyun’s chat with Sungjong and the group chat with the three of them dies down. It happens rather easily, actually. Now that Woohyun’s dating Sungyeol, all that he can talk about is how their dates go, how Sungyeol walks him home everyday, how Sungyeol has such good sense of dressing…the list of things to be said about Sungyeol is seemingly neverending. After hearing the same things over and over again, Hoya and Sungjong can no longer bear with it. They stop replying to Woohyun in the online group chat. Sungjong is sassy enough to stop replying Woohyun entirely, even in their individual chat. Hoya’s individual chat continues with Woohyun, however. He doesn’t want to lose a friend he’s had since young, from when they were neighbours.

Yet, even this chat ends up stopping when Woohyun begins making friends with Sungyeol’s friends. One of Sungyeol’s friends, Dongwoo, is also a music major. Woohyun starts talking more to Dongwoo during class time instead of Hoya, simply because he’s eager to find out what Sungyeol likes and doesn’t like so that he can please his boyfriend the best way he can. When Hoya tries to talk to him, he shushes Hoya and jerks his head towards the front, seemingly advising Hoya to pay attention to the lecturer. When Dongwoo tries to talk to him, though, he listens intently and responds accordingly.

‘Don’t you think,’ Sungjong asks one day during lunch after Hoya has just ranted, again, about Woohyun ignoring him during class time. ‘That a friendship takes two hands to clap?’

Sungjong turns his head towards Woohyun who is laughing at a joke Sungyeol had said. ‘If he isn’t trying, i don’t see why you should.’

Hoya sighs. ‘We’ve been friends since….well, it feels like since forever. I thought that would at least count for something. Don’t you remember that time we ran under the rain just to get to Woollim Cafe because they were giving out free sweet treats? And got scolded by our moms because we fell sick? It was still one of the best memories we had, one of the best memories in my life. Did that really mean nothing to him?’

Sungjong gently places his hand over Hoya’s own clasped ones on the table top. ‘Sometimes,’ he stops, trying to find the right words that won’t hurt Hoya too much.

‘Sometimes,’ he starts again, ‘we take our friendships for granted. It’s a flaw of human nature. We assume that no matter what we do, they’ll always be there for us. But that isn’t true. We need to be there for them too.’

‘Besides,’ he takes a deep breath, ‘Don’t you think Woohyun has changed? it’s like he only sees Sungyeol now. No one else matters. that kind of self-centredness….I don’t know, Hoya. It just doesn’t feel like the old Woohyun we were once friends with.’

Hoya stays silent. But he agrees with Sungjong. Woohyun no longer cares about them. It hurts, but perhaps it’s time to move on from somebody who doesn’t care.

So, secondly, Woohyun’s chat with Hoya dies down too. Hoya no longer sits with Woohyun in classes. For the first time, he attempts to make new friends. It’s hard at first, because at this time of the year, cliques have usually been formed. but he’s witty and awkward in a rather cute way, which naturally attracts some friends to him.

Woohyun barely notices that he’s lost a friendship that was once so precious to him. He still casually waves to Sungjong and Hoya along the hallways (they wave back, albeit with a slightly bitter smile). To him, Sungyeol shines as brightly as the sun, and he is but a tree who desperately needs the sun’s light to survive.

For the next five years, barring the loss of Woohyun’s friendships, he and Sungyeol have a rather smooth sailing relationship.

They go on dates. The first few are the innocent kind, the kind where they go to amusement parks and movie theatres and throw popcorn at each other. As their relationship progresses, the dates become more physical. The past innocence of their relationship is gone, with more time being spent at each others’ houses late at night, all the way until the next morning. It comes to the point where they find that there is no need to live separately any longer, and Woohyun moves into Sungyeol’s house just one week after they have both graduated from university.

They’re a happy couple, Woohyun thinks, and this is what he tells Sunggyu or Dongwoo or even Kibum, whom he had somehow managed to keep in contact with. They believe him simply because they don’t see the blatant lie in his words. They don’t see that Woohyun, the music major who has taken up a job as a producer at a top music company, comes home early to whip up a nice and warm dinner for Sungyeol, the fashion major who has ended up pursuing a modelling path. They don’t see that Sungyeol returns home at two in the morning, telling Woohyun coldly that he’s eaten out, and dinner is half-heartedly eaten by a hunchbacked Woohyun sitting alone at the dining table. They don’t see that on weekends, Sungyeol doesn’t bring Woohyun out on the dates he once did. He drives off to unknown places in the early morning, leaving Woohyun to wake up alone in bed. If they do end up going out together on weekends, it’s likely due to Woohyun’s non-stop insistence. Sungyeol usually relents with a, ‘Alright, if I do agree to go out with you this weekend, will you finally stop complaining?’

At some point in time, even Woohyun is forced to acknowledge that Sungyeol may no longer be the boy he once loved, the boy he once knew. (or did he even know Sungyeol?) But the high pride from his university days remains. He refuses to admit to anyone else, even himself, that his love is, in fact, not reciprocated. He continues keeping up a facade in front of others.

It’s a common saying, however, that lies cannot be kept up for too long. For Woohyun, his world, so carefully built on lies, falls apart on a bright Saturday morning. He has just returned to Korea from a five day business trip to Paris. As he sits in the taxi on the way to the apartment he and Sungyeol share, he gazes out of the window, a small smile on his face. Even though Sungyeol hasn’t replied many of his texts or answered any of his calls, he remembers Sungyeol’s schedule from a post-it Sungyeol had accidentally left on the sofa before. If he isn’t wrong, Sungyeol shouldn’t have anything on today, which means that Sungyeol should be waiting for him at home. While he’s excited, he’s also cautious of getting his hopes up, especially since Sungyeol hasn’t been particularly loving towards him recently. But they haven’t even seen each other in five days. Five days! Surely Sungyeol must miss him somewhat…right?

The taxi pulls into the driveway of the fifteen storied building, leaving Woohyun to face his first disappointment of the day when he finds that there is no one waiting for him. No one is there to help him carry his luggage out of the taxi trunk, no one is there to help him carry his luggage up nine flights of stairs (the lift is under repair) and no one is there to greet him as he faces the door of their apartment. Hesitantly, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his key, slotting it into the keyhole of the door carefully. As the door swings open, eerily, almost as if he were in a horror movie, he steps inside cautiously. The house is quiet. Too quiet, for a 11 am morning. Sungyeol, being an early riser, is usually up by 9 am. Maybe he had gone out? Woohyun drags his luggage into the apartment with a sigh, further disappointment clouding his thoughts. Clearly, his faith in Sungyeol had been misplaced. As usual.

With a loud yawn, he makes his way to the bedroom, preparing to plop onto the bed and just catch a quick nap. He hadn’t been able to sleep well on the plane, and with the physical strength required to carry his luggage up the stairs, he’s plainly exhausted. Rubbing his eyes, he gently pushes open the bedroom door.

And finds someone snoring gently next to Sungyeol on the bed. Both the unknown guy and Sungyeol are wrapped in the blanket, Sungyeol’s arms tightly encircling the unknown guy’s waist. They look peaceful, relaxed, almost as if there is nothing more comforting than being in each other’s presence. As Sungyeol snuggles into the crook of the guy’s neck, Woohyun knows that his worst fear has come true. His fear, that Sungyeol would find someone better than Woohyun, someone whom he loves more than Woohyun.

There are two types of people with cheating partners, when facing this situation. One type, the type who has recognised the signs, acknowledges it defeatedly without so much as a fight. The second type, the type who refuses to accept reality, breaks down and confronts the cheating partner, turning it into a messy fight.

Woohyun is neither. Woohyun is a mixture of both. He refuses to accept reality yet at the same time, he’s never been much of the confrontational type. And so, he takes the easiest route out.

Holding his hand over his mouth to prevent gasps from escaping while tears flow freely down his face, he runs out of the apartment, hoping for some sort of reprieve. He has no idea where to go, yet he runs - runs away from the reality that has presented itself in the cruelest way possible. It hurts far too much. He’s given his all to Sungyeol, his sun, and this is what Sungyeol gives him in return. It's not so simple as a heartbreak. It feels like his heart is being ripped out, a painful sensation pulsing through the beating organ. The world, once full of various colours to him, is now dully coloured with shades of grey.

It’s all too much to take, really, and as he runs across the roads, down the streets, he finally removes his hand, letting the gasps out. Passer-bys stare, but he’s so focused on himself that he can’t care less. It’s only when he reaches a point of exhaustion that he collapses onto the ground, in a corner of a street, and buries his head in his hands. For the most absurd reason, when he doesn’t want it to, his mind keeps replaying the scene this morning.

Shaking his head, he lets out a frustrated cry. It’s as if he’s attempting to toss the thought out of his head, even though it’s physically and mentally impossible. When that doesn’t work, he looks up across the street, blinking away the tears furiously. He’s looking for a distraction desperately, to avoid having to think about it at all. The aching feeling in his heart is gnawing away at him, creating an emptiness that previously wasn’t there. He just wants to forget about it- forget about Sungyeol- forget about his love for Sungyeol-

His thoughts are cut off abruptly, when his vision focuses on the shop opposite him. He knows the shop. He’s loved the baked goods from the shop since young, and there are so many adolescent memories associated with the shop. He hasn’t been here in a long time though, having been far too busy with school and Sungyeol, so he’s amazed to see that the shop is still here.

Maybe this is fate, he thinks. That of all the places I would run to, it would be here.

With that thought in mind, he pulls out his phone from his pocket with shaky hands, and dials a number.

--

a/n: so, who did woohyun call?

welp. i said i would (hopefully) update by 9/5 but real life happened (plus this woogyu fic) ;; i'm sorry.

i'm also sorry for extending this fic to a three-shot ;; i really didn't expect it to be this long haha as a really inexperienced writer i thought i would write a one-shot because i'm not pro enough to write more than that but gfkdgfkjdsfksd idk!? somehow!? it just got longer and longer :( i promise the third chapter will be the last though, since it deals with the consequences.

aaaaand hfkjdskfjdsdks woo!! hyun!! cutest sunshine on earth had his solo debut on 9/5, please give him all the love (that he didn't get in this fic)! he deserves it :( everytime he sings, it's like an angel singing. it's just too ethereal. fkjdsgfdsgkfgsk i know not a lot of people read this fic but just wanted to ask yall to please stream the links below so he can get his first solo win ;;;;;; and don't forget to stream on melon/genie/bugs/olleh/naver/ any music sites! most importantly of all, vote on mnet and mbc show champ (we're second)!!

mv

tudou