CHAPTER FIVE

Siwon suspected he had heard wrong. Kyuhyun couldn´t have said he was going to move in with Joon. That was impossible. It simply couldn´t happen. It couldn´t.

As all the blood slowly froze in his veins, as he felt them hardening beneath his skin, Siwon was sure he could see frost beginning to form and cover his hands and his arms, and surely it must be climbing up his neck because he was so ing cold he could hardly draw in breath. He was suddenly, so overpoweringly cold to the bone that it physically hurt. He ached. And felt brittle.

He saw Kyuhyun´s fingers inch over Junjae´s back toward his, and Siwon quickly snatched them away for fear that if Kyuhyun touched them they would shatter into shards of broken ice. And then where would he be?

He looked up and saw Kyuhyun´s lips were moving, but for some reason no sound was coming out, and his eyes looked sad. Siwon hated it when Kyuhyun´s eyes looked that way. So many of the things Kyuhyun got away with were because of those eyes. Now, however, he wasn´t so sure the eyes alone would be enough to let Kyuhyun get away with what he just said.

There were only so many times Siwon could indulge Kyuhyun. There was only so much he could take. Before something twisted. Before it broke.

Siwon jumped when the phone next to the bed rang. There appeared to still be sound in the world, and Siwon couldn´t figure out how or why none of it was coming from Kyuhyun´s mouth.

Kyuhyun made an annoyed face and reached over and picked it up before the ringing could wake up Junjae. Even when he answered it, his mouth continued to move, but Siwon heard nothing at all.

He saw Kyuhyun´s hand come up to the mouthpiece to cover it as he mouthed, “It´s Victoria.”

Siwon hadn´t a clue why he even bothered trying to mouth the words, since even if he had screamed them at the top of his lungs, Siwon wouldn´t have been able to hear him anyway.

Kyuhyun rolled off the side of the bed and walked out of the room so he could talk without disturbing Junjae´s sleep.

Once Kyuhyun was gone, a strange whoosh of sound entered the room in his wake. Siwon could hear Junjae breathing deeply beside him. He could hear his joints creaking and cracking as he curled his fingers into tight fists. He could hear his heartbeat. He could also hear his stomach roiling and churning.

Siwon rolled off the bed and rushed out the door and down the hall in a panic. He had to get to his studio bathroom, far away from where Kyuhyun was at the moment. With shaky hands, he managed to get the doorknob to turn, and he stumbled inside the small bathroom nestled within the safety of his studio.

He the water in the sink to try to mask the sounds, then fell to his knees in front of the toilet and puked his guts up. Hacking. Coughing. Gagging. Choking. He threw up absolutely everything that was foul and sad and lonely inside him.

He felt the sweat break out in a sickly film on his forehead. His sides ached. His throat burned. He shook from head to toe. And still, he couldn´t stop.

There was so much in him he wanted to flush away so much that blackened his insides that he just couldn´t stop. He was afraid if he didn´t stop soon, his heart would come up with everything else and he´d lose what little there was of it left. So much of it was gone already, he just couldn´t spare any more and still stay alive.

When he finally stopped choking and gagging, he pushed away from the toilet and leaned forward until his face was pressed into the cool tile of the floor. The hands that had fallen away from their grip on the toilet now lay flat on the floor, slowly sliding up until they were resting on either side of his face.

And then, there was this noise. This strange broken noise. Like something cracking or shattering. It wasn´t until he felt the burning tears fall down his cheeks and drop to the floor beneath him that Siwon realized the noises were coming from him.

His mouth was open as if he were wailing, but so sound other than choked and splintered noises and crackles were coming out. Nothing. He wanted to wail and sob and howl, but nothing would come but the scorching tears. Everything was still stuck in his throat, in his guts. He had been so sure he had thrown everything up he could possibly have inside him but there was still enough bitterness and hurt in there to tangle up and block his cries from falling from his mouth. All that was left were the hot tears and silent broken wails.

“Mozart?” – Kyuhyun whispered when Siwon´s face turned white as the sheets.

“Mozart?...Siwon?”

Kyuhyun´s voice kept getting smaller and smaller and more unsure the longer Siwon stared at him without seeming to see him. He was looking at him with those eyes Kyuhyun hated. The eyes that were far away and lonely and lost. Kyuhyun hated those eyes.

Why had he even said it? Why had he told him? Kyuhyun had no idea why the words spilled from his mouth, and he burned to take them back. Anything at all to get rid of those eyes. Those eyes ripped him to shreds.

He realized Siwon was shrinking in on himself, was curling away from him, so Kyuhyun reached out his fingers towards Siwon´s. Kyuhyun almost jumped out of his skin when Siwon quickly snatched his hand away. That little involuntary reflex, that split second when his mind told his body to pull away from him shattered Kyuhyun.

Siwon had never pulled away from him before. Never. Kyuhyun didn´t know what to do. But before he could do anything at all, the phone rang, and he had to quickly answer it before the ringing woke up Junjae.

He broke eye contact with Siwon to answer it. When he heard Victoria´s voice on the other end and turned back to Siwon to let him know who it was, he saw the same far off look in his eyes. It was as if he were frozen in place.

“It´s Vic.” – he mouthed.

Siwon didn´t make any indication that he had heard him at all. He was still frozen. Kyuhyun decided to leave the room while he talked to Vic so as to not disturb Junjae. And, if he were to be completely truthful, to get away from those eyes just long enough to gather his thoughts. To come up with a plan. A way to make the eyes go away. Or at least construct a crude time machine that could take him back about five minutes to the time when he still had his foot out of his mouth. And this ache out of