Yixing approaches Kyungsoo during the town’s annual end-of-summer cookout.

“Mind if I sit?”

“Go ahead,” Kyungsoo nods, running his fingers across the plastic ridges of his cup.

A silence settles, and Kyungsoo can see Yixing staring at him out of the corner of his eyes. He’s reluctant to break the silence, but before he can quietly exit Yixing opens his mouth.

“I know what you did,” he says, and Kyungsoo stiffens ever so slightly.

He keeps his mouth shut, waiting to hear what comes next. Without realizing it, he picks out Minseok in the crowd, milling around and making easy conversation with everyone.

“Guess what I found the other day?” Yixing takes something out of his pocket and it glitters in the fading sunlight, winking up at him.

Kyungsoo nearly spills his drink

“It got caught in my fishing net,” Yixing says, turning the necklace around in his hands. “It’s Luhan’s.”

“I haven’t seen you this serious in years,” Kyungsoo mentions casually, more interested his empty cup than meeting Yixing’s eyes.

“I know why you did it,” Yixing continues, ignoring him. “And you’re wrong.”

A hollow laugh escapes Kyungsoo’s lips.

“Yeah? And here I was, thinking you’d be the last person to believe that.”

“Just because my parents died trying to leave doesn’t mean everyone will,” Yixing says dryly, but Kyungsoo knows that even after all these years he’s still hurting.

The car accident was passed around town for a month in whispers behind Yixing’s back. On the way back to the city, their car had crashed, and the only reason Yixing was even alive was because of his mother. Kyungsoo knows that Yixing still has nightmares about her dead body, hugging him as he lay trapped in a car with a crushed roof, and he knows that Yixing hasn’t been in a car ever since the accident.

“You almost died too.”

“But I’m still here, aren’t I?” Yixing says, bitter tones punctuating his words despite his efforts to keep calm. “You’re paranoid, Kyungsoo.”

“When’s the last time you heard from Junmyeon?” Kyungsoo asks, and Yixing frowns, suddenly uneasy.

“What?”

“Didn’t think so. How about Sehun and Jongin? Do they look like they’re having a good time?”

Yixing remembers how gaunt Sehun had looked when he returned and how Jongin had flitted around him like a mother hen the entire time, insisting on carrying all the luggage himself. He watched with careful eyes as they conversed in low, scared whispers, and had stood off to the side as Sehun collapsed in Minseok’s arms, too exhausted to lift up his arms for a proper hug. Jongin had hovered around Sehun and Minseok the entire time, never letting either of them out of his sight.

And now, during one of the last nights of summer, Yixing sees Sehun sitting a distance away from the rest of the crowd, Jongin glued to his side. He traces Sehun’s gaze to Minseok, who’s smiling and making merry.

“What about Chanyeol? Do you still think he’s addicted to drugs?” Kyungsoo says harshly. Yixing flexes his fingers.

“How did you become so twisted, Kyungsoo?” He wonders aloud, keeping his voice light.

“I’m not the one who always has wool over his eyes because he’s too afraid to face reality.”

“You don’t deserve Minseok.

“And Luhan does?”

“No,” Yixing says quietly. “He doesn’t either.”

Kyungsoo turns towards Yixing and he swears he could pierce into his soul with that stare.

“Do you think you deserve Minseok, Yixing?

“No,” he says, and he means it. “No, I don’t.”

They lapse into another silence, nerves on the edge of calm and tense, and Yixing isn’t quite sure which side he’s on.

“People spend their entire lives searching for happiness, but what they don’t realize is that sometimes its just around the corner,” Kyungsoo’s words cut into the quiet, shaking Yixing out of his own head

“And what if it’s not?”

“Then you just have to make your own.”

“Even if it means breaking someone else’s in the process?”

Kyungsoo hums thoughtfully for a moment, eyes finding Minseok once again.

“Do you think he looks unhappy?

“You deceived him, Kyungsoo. He trusted you and you betrayed that. Don’t you feel bad? Don’t you feel anything?”

Yixing doesn’t get a response, and he stands up, dusting dirt off his jeans.

“Summer will end soon enough, Kyungsoo, and Minseok will find out what you did.

“Are you going to tell him?” Kyungsoo glances his way, not sure what answer he’s looking for.

“No,” Yixing smiles sadly, “Because I hope one day you will.”

The wedding is small and made in Minseok’s vision.

They exchange vows in the fields they grew up in, surrounded by a small circle of family and friends. The wind feels the same as it did all those years ago, and Minseok looks just as beautiful with neatly styled hair as he does with grass sticking out of it.

On that day, Minseok’s smile shines bright enough to obscure the shadow of guilt wrapped around Kyungsoo’s heart, and in those blissful hours the words Yixing had said to him that one summer night melt away.

Kyungsoo wakes up an hour before his alarm is supposed to ring and finds Minseok silently crying into his shoulder. Alarmed, he sits up, moving to pull him closer

“What’s wrong?”

Minseok shakes his head, furiously wiping his tears away, and Kyungsoo’s chest seizes with anxiety.

“Why are you crying? Please talk to me.”

“Do you know you have nightmares? I’ve woken up early every day for this past week, and you’re always frowning, shoulders tensed,” Minseok says quietly. “I should be asking you what’s wrong.”

“You worry so much,” Kyungsoo mumbles, grabbing Minseok’s hand and tracing his fingers over his ring. “You shouldn’t cry for me.”

“Kyungsoo…”

“Yeah?”

“Are you happy?”

Against his will, Kyungsoo’s mind returns to the last time he had seen Junmyeon. He worked at Kart’s, and during Junmyeon’s checkout he had asked the same question he was facing now. Painfully so, he remembers the uncertainty on his old friend’s face, the hope, the note.

As he meet’s Minseok’s eyes, holds the hand of the man who trusted him enough to throw away his dream for a new one, Kyungsoo comes across the terrible realization that his happiness was not made—it was stolen.

And now, long overdue, it was time to return it.

“Minseok,” he begins, “I have something to tell you.”

Notes:

thank you for reading and 
i hope you're happy