pairing: ChenLay
length: 1044 words

Jongdae fiddled with his webcam, adjusting the angle of the camera so that it wouldn’t showcase him in an unflattering angle when the video call started later. Once he was satisfied with its position, he ran to the bathroom to check his outfit and his hair. With a hasty flick of his comb and a quick pat along the bottom hem of his shirt, Jongdae grinned at his reflection.

The familiar jingle of an incoming call then sounded from his room, so he ran back and shut the door behind him. After jumping into his brown leather swivel chair, Jongdae patted his hair once more and then accepted the video call.

“What’s up, Dae?” Yixing beamed at him through the laptop screen. “How’ve you been?”

“Same old, same old,” Jongdae answered with a wry chuckle. “Nothing much has changed since the last time we called. What about you? How’s work?”

“Busy,” the Chinese male said with a slight grimace. “I’ve got dozens of conference calls and meetings every day, and I also have a stack of assignments that I need to finish.”

Jongdae furrowed his eyebrows as he worriedly asked, “Am I bothering you then? Should we reschedule the call to another time when you’re not as busy?”

“Oh, no, I’d much rather talk to you and hang out,” Yixing quickly answered, waving his hands in reassurance. “You don’t know how much I’ve been looking forward to this call. It was honestly the only thing keeping me sane when I got buried in work.”

“Alright, but if you need to leave, just let me know.” Jongdae then let out a long sigh and pouted. “I really miss seeing you in person though, Yixing. Even though I’m glad we can still talk to each other like this, it’s not the same as actually being with you in the same place.”

Yixing nodded in agreement, wearing a rueful smile. “I know. I wish I could be with you right now too. As soon as work lets up, I’ll hop on a plane and fly to you.”

“I’m holding you to that,” Jongdae replied with a bright laugh. His voice then turned somber again as he added, “But I honestly never imagined it would be so difficult to be so physically distant. Like I’m not worried that we’re so far apart, per se, but it’s weird when I realize that you’ve been gone for over a year now.”

“That just means I’ve only got a year left at this office,” Yixing pointed out optimistically, resting his chin against his palm. “I’m going to ask my supervisor to keep me at the Seoul office from now on, so we don’t have to go through this a second or third time.”

“And by then, I should have enough flexibility to travel with you if you do have to transfer to another office,” Jongdae trilled, the ends of his lips quirking upwards. “You don’t think anything crazy will happen in between that’ll change things up, do you?”

“Nah, everything is pretty cut-and-dry here,” the Chinese male reassured him. “And even if something does come up, we’ll figure it out like we did with this.”

“I guess…” Jongdae sighed again.

“Anyway, do you wanna watch a movie together?” Yixing proposed, trying to distract the younger male from his overwhelming distress. “We haven’t had a movie night in a while.”

“Yeah, let me look through Netflix and see what’s there.” Jongdae adjusted the screen so that Yixing’s face was still visible as he pulled up a new window to search for a movie. “Yeesh, there’s really not much on here anymore,” the younger male noted with a frown. “Maybe that’s why we haven’t watched anything together lately.”

The Chinese male chuckled. “What about Disney Plus? There’s a bunch of stuff on there that we like.”

“I actually wanted to re-watch Robin Hood the other day,” Jongdae told him as he navigated to the other streaming site. “It’s been years since I last watched that movie and I forget what I saw that reminded me of it, but it’s been in the back of my mind ever since.”

“Ooh-de-lally, ooh-de-lally, golly, what a day,” Yixing blithely sang. “Oh wow, I’m surprised I remembered the tune. I remember watching it over and over again when I was a kid.”

“It’s such an underrated gem, along with Oliver and Company,” the younger male said with a shake of his head. Jongdae then launched into a soulful rendition of the song, “Why Should I Worry?” from the animated film and Yixing clapped along, adding howling ad-libs in the background.

Once the song was over, the Chinese male joked, “Maybe we should just skip the movies and go straight to karaoke.”

“Oh man, we haven’t gone to a coin karaoke room is such a long time. That’ll be the first thing we do once you’re back,” Jongdae declared.

“At the very least,” Yixing disappeared from the screen for a few moments before returning with a small handheld fan, “we can still pretend and sing as much as we want right now for free.”

Jongdae grabbed his cylindrical pencil case to use as a makeshift microphone and then belted out a rousing rendition of “Two Worlds” from Tarzan. As heart-wrenching as the lyrics were, especially when he recalled the opening scene of the movie, Jongdae loved the song and what it represented.

Two worlds, one family.

Guided together to fill what was once lost.

In a way, it mirrored his relationship with Yixing.

Although they were from two different cultures with two vastly different upbringings, they had still managed to come together as one.

When they had been alone and struggling, unsure of the future and what it held for them, they had somehow serendipitously appeared in each other’s lives.

Even now, they were living in two worlds once again. But their lives would be guided together again in time. He just had to be patient and keep his head raised.

In the meantime, he’d help lift Yixing’s spirits up high, giving him strength whenever the other male needed it. Through the screen, on the phone, or via text messages, Jongdae would never stop telling Yixing how much he meant to him and how much he missed him.

♈♈♈