XII

What woke Eunhyuk up the next morning were the soft tones of a piano playing in the distance. His eyes slowly fluttered open and he stared up at the ceiling, listened and wondered if he was hallucinating or if the sounds were really there. They were; he quickly realized that. What wasn’t there anymore however was the pleasant body heat that he had fallen asleep next to the night before. Absentmindedly he brushed his arm over the cold sheets beside him and thought that he really needed a hug in that moment because his body was still so tense from crying and the last night's happenings once again started clouding his mind.

The nice piano music suddenly came to a stop. He heard the shuffling of feet instead and as he looked to the open door he could see Donghae peeping in. "Good morning, Hyukkie!"

A warm smile was his gift that morning and Donghae already made his way over to the bed, flung himself next to him and threw one leg over the raven head's body.

"Hey there", Eunhyuk greeted him and felt the goosebumps on his skin disappear as Donghae's warmth enveloped him.

Donghae pressed a tender kiss against Eunhyuk's cheek and giggled. "Did you sleep well?"

He couldn’t help but to grin. "I always sleep well when you're next to me."

"Oh. Then I have to come to your house more often."

Eunhyuk sighed, his heart heavy. "Donghae…"

The other just giggled and hugged him tighter, his hair tickling under his nose as he made himself comfortable on Eunhyuk's chest.               
If he could Eunhyuk would stop the clocks. He wanted to stay with Donghae like this forever, without anyone separating them or forcing them apart. What he longed for was a place where they could just be, without anyone or anything interrupting them. Yet he was unsure what to do, now that they had kissed. Were they a couple now? Could they even be a couple under those circumstances? If they wanted to be together they had to leave the city, maybe even the country. The people that Donghae worked for wouldn’t let him go so the only way for them to have a relationship was to flee. Or they had to hide. Forever.

While thinking he had unconsciously found the younger's hand and he only noticed this as he squeezed it slightly – and heard him hiss in response. Eunhyuk lifted his head and looked down; as he got a glimpse of the brunet's hands his eyes widened and he quickly sat up.

"What happened to your hands?" he asked in an alarmed tone and almost was too afraid to touch them. Both of Donghae's hands were colored in various shades of red, purple and blue, his knuckles were scratched and there stuck a bit of dried blood to some spots. His wide eyes found to Donghae's and the other looked almost a bit guilty.

"Yours look the same", he mumbled.

Eunhyuk quickly turned his own hands and had to admit that he was right. He had punched the walls of his apartment the night before, what else did he expect? Donghae however… He hadn't done the same. Right?

"What did you do?" Eunhyuk wanted to know.

"I don't know…" Donghae shrugged his shoulders. "I woke up like this. Maybe it happened at work."

Okay, this was highly possible and Eunhyuk didn’t even want to think about all the different ways clients were able to hurt Donghae. But Eunhyuk had punched the walls so hard the night before and Donghae's hands still looked so much worse than his. His knuckles hadn't been bleeding, they were just a bit red and swollen. But Donghae's…

"It's alright, Hyukkie", he beamed, as if he knew how worried Eunhyuk was. "It doesn’t hurt that much. I could play the piano well, it just stings a bit sometimes."

Eunhyuk doubted that it didn’t hurt more but he also doubted that Donghae was able to lie. "Alright… But we should still put something cold onto the wounds."

He pushed the blanket off his legs and wanted to get up, but Donghae quickly wrapped his arms around his waist and stopped him from leaving.

"Can we please cuddle for some more first?" he asked and it almost sounded whiney. Eunhyuk sighed.

"Okay…"

They settled back between the sheets and Donghae covered both of them with the duvet. A kiss was placed on his chin and Eunhyuk couldn’t help but to smile as Donghae showered his face with kisses just to be rewarded with a peck on the lips. How could he even think of leaving bed when Donghae was still there and wanted to cuddle?

***

Eunhyuk was just in the middle of taking a shower as he heard someone ringing the doorbell. "No", he groaned and tried to hurry, quickly washing the last remnants of body wash off his body. The ringing continued, got frequent and ended in one buzzing sound that made him cry out in annoyance. He stepped out of the shower and quickly wrapped a towel around his waist that he somehow tried to keep in place as he struggled his way towards the door, his hair still partly covered with shampoo. Slipping past Donghae – who had a dustpan and a hand brush in his hands, halfway done cleaning the mess Eunhyuk had made in the hallway and now looked seriously scared – he sent him a reassuring smile because he already knew who this was.

"Good mor-"

The words were stuck in Sora's throat as she noticed the scene that took place right in front of her. Eunhyuk half- and fumbling around with his towel, clearly looking rushed. She slightly tilted her head to the side and caught sight of Donghae in the hallway, still dressed but not less suspicious. A grin was plastered to her face and it was so freaking smug that it made Eunhyuk's cheeks turn deeply red.

"It's not what you're thinking", he quickly said, but his voice was low, shaky and not at all as convincing as he wanted it to be. Sora didn’t say anything, she just stared at him in a way that he wanted the ground to open up and swallow him.

"Oh hi", she suddenly said and pushed Eunhyuk out of the way so she could walk up to Donghae. "You must be Donghae, right? Hyukjae told me so much about you!"

Donghae blinked his eyes many times in a row, clearly nervous. "H-He did?"

"Oh, yes!" She grinned at him. "I'm Hyukjae's noona, my name is Sora. Nice to meet you!"

She bowed slightly and Donghae was quick to do the same. "I'm Donghae."

"I know, sweetie", she said, making him blush and Eunhyuk groan. "Hyukjae, why don’t you go and finish your shower? I'll entertain Donghae in the meantime."

Eunhyuk wanted to protest, but he admitted that the situation was a bit strange, to say the least. He sighed and was just about to shut the door as he saw Choco heading to her owner. Donghae noticed her as well, beamed and crouched down – this was enough to let all alarm bells in Eunhyuk's head ring.

"Don’t touch her!" he yelled and even Sora was visibly tense.

"Choco doesn’t like strangers", she added, but Donghae didn’t seem to mind.

The brunet spread his arms slightly and Choco stopped to sniff on his fingers, not growling or snarling. Eunhyuk almost didn’t dare to breathe because he was so scared that Choco would bite those cute fingers, but to his surprise nothing like that happened. Instead, Choco's tail started wagging, then she over Donghae's hand, barked cheerfully – and in the end happily jumped around until Donghae picked her up. While she was busy Donghae's face, the siblings exchanged a quick glance to tell each other that this was without doubt the strangest thing they had seen in a while.

"Oh, she likes you", Sora breathed and chuckled a bit awkwardly. "Usually she hates everyone at first… Well, not me because I got her as a puppy, but she also hates my husband even though she knows him just as long as me and he feeds her every day."

"Choco doesn’t hate anyone", Donghae explained and giggled cutely. "She just doesn’t like meeting new people because it stresses her. But if you're friendly to her she gets friendly too. She's just a bit shy."

"Wow, are you a dog therapist?" Sora wanted to know with big eyes, still amazed by the fact that Choco couldn’t stop wagging her tail.

"No, this is just obvious to me", he said and sounded a bit embarrassed.

"Can you tell me why she doesn’t like my husband then?"

"Is he friendly to her?"

"Well, actually… He treats her just like my brother does."

She crossed her arms in front of her chest and sent said brother a glare.

"If you would excuse me, I'd like to finish my shower", Eunhyuk butted in and dropped a curtsy before quickly shuffling off. He could hear them laugh together before he closed the bathroom door. At least they got along. This couldn’t be wrong.

He came back about fifteen minutes later and this timespan obviously had been long enough to let Sora and Donghae become best friends. They were laughing together like they had known each other for years and Eunhyuk couldn’t ignore the jealousy rising inside of him; until then he had been the only one who Donghae was so cheerful around.

"Come here, Hyukjae", Sora called and patted the seat between her and Donghae. "We've just been talking about you."

"Is that good or bad?"

"Only good, of course!" she exclaimed. Eunhyuk didn’t believe her. Not at all.

He made his way over to the couch, stopped however as Choco, on Donghae's lap, started snarling again.

"Don't worry", Donghae said and for a second Eunhyuk thought that he was talking to him. "Hyukkie is nice, he won't do anything bad."

Eunhyuk scoffed. "Donghae, you're talking to a dog", he said and cautiously sat down between him and his sister. His eyes didn’t leave Choco and he was surprised to see that she kept quiet and in the end simply ignored him. This was the closest he had ever been to her without fearing that she bit off his finger. He was impressed.

"So the both of you are together, I see?"

Eunhyuk stared at Sora in shock and was even more shocked as he noticed that she had folded her hands over her knee, legs crossed, and looked at them like she was a couple therapist. "Er…"

"In New Zealand you're allowed to marry, you know?"

"Noona, no one here is about to marry!" Eunhyuk exclaimed and hated that he once again was turning red. No, he didn’t hate it. He just highly disliked it.

Sora raised her hands in defeat. "I just wanted to mention it", she said innocently.

"Is it true that we could marry?" Donghae asked and Eunhyuk felt that this was a conversation he didn’t want to have yet.

"Yeah, but… It's only for the law. S-So… Even if we would be there we couldn’t marry in church, if you were thinking about that."

Donghae frowned and it was clearly to see that he didn’t understand this. "Why not?"

"Because… It's not allowed. Some countries allow it so you can be a married couple on paper, but there is no country in the world that allows couples who aren't heteroual to marry at church and get the blessings normal couples get", Sora explained wisely and Eunhyuk was glad that she was patient and didn’t wonder why Donghae didn’t know about things like that.

"I don’t understand this", Donghae mumbled and looked down, his fingers playing with Choco's soft fur. "I mean, it's okay if some couples are fine with a certificate, but… Isn't marrying about making a promise to God? I thought that when you do it in church you introduce your partner to him and promise that you will stay with them… If you can't marry like this then… isn't something missing? I know that not everyone wants to do it but when you do… Who forbids this?"

There were many different answers bustling about in Eunhyuk's head, but he didn’t dare to say anything. This was a risky topic and he didn’t want to say anything that could be interpreted wrongly. Gladly, Sora was still there.

"I believe that you can make a promise like this without being at church. There sadly isn't any other choice and I know that it's unfair, but… What you can do is promise it at church as a building, but without audience. It's still a holy place and – at least for me – it feels even holier when no one is talking in the front. You can still feel a presence, right? There is only one who has to listen and he will hear it if you believe in it. And believing is what all of this is about, isn't it? Talking about beliefs: I think that it should be legal."

"Because it's the same love?" Donghae asked quietly. She winked at him and smiled softly.

"Exactly. I see nothing wrong in this. So why preaching about love and if we do, we get punished? This doesn’t make any sense. But well…" She shrugged her shoulders and sighed. "We are not the ones who will change anything about it. Just know that you already have my blessings, guys."

Donghae smiled and Eunhyuk lowered his head even more, ears flaming red. "I don’t think we're ready to marry already, noona…"

"Why not?"

"Because we kissed for the first time just yesterday!" he suddenly erupted.

"Ooooh! Sorry, I didn’t know!" Her gaze darted from her brother to Donghae and back. "So it's all still new and exciting?"

Donghae hummed and smiled cutely. "It is…"

"How adorable! You make a good couple!"

Donghae bowed his head and shyly reached out for Eunhyuk's hand to intertwine their fingers. The raven head was glad that Donghae's sleeves were long enough to hide his wounds; he didn’t want Sora to ask questions about them.

"How are you?" Eunhyuk asked into the pleasant silence around them and looked at his sister. "I was pretty worried about you last night."

"Just because I got loud and told our parents to stay away from you and me until they learn how to treat their children?" She waved her hand and laughed. "That was nothing. You should see me while watching rugby."

He laughed lowly but his heartbeat quickened, even when Donghae gave his hand a reassuring squeeze. "If they really stay away from me I have a problem. The grocery store doesn’t make that much money yet, you know? They also pay this apartment…"

Sora didn’t hesitate and reached for her bag, pulled out her purse. "Here", she said and scribbled something onto a piece of paper before she gave him her EC card. "That's the number you need."

"N-Noona-"

"It's alright. You can give it back to me once you come and visit me." She showed him her tongue and didn’t allow any objections as she put her bag to the side.

"Thank you…"

"It's nothing."

Eunhyuk couldn’t put into words how glad he was that he had a sister like her. She wasn’t there often, but when she was she always made sure that he was alright. If New Zealand wouldn’t be so far away he already had visited her lots of times.

"It's good to know how they think now", she said and scoffed. "I don’t want them to be around my baby when they do nothing but spit venom. I'd rather let him or her grow up without grandparents than having to explain what kind of bull they talk. Apart from that Jinho has parents who are nice, aren't prejudiced and live on the same island. Thank you very much."

She scoffed and shook her head. Now that she was sitting next to him, dressed in a pullover and not a loosely f