He knows Kim Heechul a lot better than Kim Heechul knows him. He’s tried hard to read the expressions across Heechul’s face many times before, but he still can’t. He has no idea of what the man is thinking, of when he’ll laugh or when he’ll snap.

But he understands. He has a faint understanding of the man, no matter how complex and confusing his behavior and personality is.

So he knows from the start, when Heechul makes something up about there being a delivery. He doesn’t know why he’s lying, but he reaches the understanding that Heechul is attempting to deceive him. He pretends to believe him, nodding and smiling.

When he tells Heechul he misses him, he sees the expression written across his hyung’s face. He doesn’t know what it means, but he understands that Heechul isn’t completely focused on his words.

When he says “I love you”, and Heechul replies with “I love you too”, he doesn’t know what the emotions in Heechul’s eyes read, but he understands well enough that Heechul doesn’t mean it.

It hurts, even though he already knows. In this twisted fantasy that he continues to live in, he’s desperately in love with somebody who will never love him back. The reality hurts, and every time Heechul says it, it’s like another spear piercing through his heart.

And yet, he continues with his twisted fantasy. He moves closer to Heechul, and as expected, his hyung doesn’t mind. He tells Heechul he misses him once again, and Heechul responds similarly. Once again, he doesn’t know why Heechul bothers, but he understands that it’s a lie.

He kisses his hyung’s neck, something he always does. He doesn’t react.

He isn’t surprised. It hurts, but this is the twisted fantasy that he chooses to live in.

When he asks Heechul if there’s anything on his mind and Heechul gives out yet another excuse, he nods his head, pretending to buy the excuse. He knows that there is something on his hyung’s mind, but he doesn’t know what. He does, however, understand well that his hyung is the type of person to stay up late every night playing games, so sleeping late would never affect him.

And then Heechul pulls him close and begins to kiss his jawline roughly, and he allows himself to enjoy it. He doesn’t know what it is that causes him to be like this, but he understands that the lips that plant little kisses down his skin aren’t sincere.

Their gazes meet, and their eyes are both glassy. He’s sure his own is a mix of lust and love for Heechul, and he can see a reflection of his own expression in his eyes. He doesn’t know who, but he understands that the tender emotion in the man's gaze is not meant for him.

He kisses Heechul hard like he’s been longing to ever since he woke up to Heechul’s disappearance last month. Heechul kisses back with equal aggressiveness, and he feels Heechul’s nails digging into his back sharply.

Once again, it’s impossible for him to know the reason, to understand the emotions and thoughts running through Heechul’s mind. It’s impossible for him to realize what Heechul is feeling from the touch of his lips.

But he understands that when he closed his eyes and his lips met Heechul’s almost desperately, Heechul didn’t close his eyes.

He doesn’t know anything. He doesn’t know why Heechul does what he does. He’s never known. He’s never known why Heechul has the ability to make his legs tremble and make his pupils dilate and make him turn into jelly either. He’s never known why he wants to stay trapped within this twisted fairytale even though there were fairytales waiting for him out there.

He’s never known why or how he fell so deeply in love with the man known as Kim Heechul.

But as Heechul’s eyes, remaining unforgivingly open, widen and he feels himself being pushed away abruptly, he comes to the understanding that he is not the one that Kim Heechul is in love with.

As Heechul stares at him and whispers “I’m sorry”, he can’t identify the mix of emotions in those two words, but he understands what it entails.

Now he’s crying, he’s crying out of his own foolishness and his foolish heart, he’s crying because he ended up falling in love with someone who didn’t love him back, he’s crying because his foolish heart gave him no choice but to live within the chapters of this twisted fantasy.

The hot tears make their way down his cheeks, he’s crying hard enough that his shoulders are beginning to tremble, and he feels Heechul’s fingers the tears away, and as usual he’s too weak to bring himself to push him away.

He’s crying harder, because even though it’s come to an end his foolish heart still wants to live in the realm of this twisted fantasy more.

Or maybe he’s crying hard not because his foolish heart craves for more, but because he understands what the end of his twisted realm means.

A twisted fantasy only transforms into a fairytale when the protagonist finds true love and happiness.

Heechul’s still staring at him, not knowing how to react, his eyes wide and his mouth agape. The man his foolish heart chose to fall for, the man who gave the love that was never his to somebody else.

He doesn’t know who, or how, or why.

He doesn’t know why it could never be him.

He doesn’t know why it was never him.

He doesn’t know why their twisted fantasy could never be a fairytale starring the both of them.

He doesn’t know who it is who is special enough to have Heechul’s love.

He doesn’t know how Heechul fell in love for the first time in his life.

But as hard as it is to accept the reality, he comes to the understanding that the man his foolish heart still pines for has found his own fairytale.

And just like that, the chapters in their twisted fantasy abruptly came to their end.

Not theirs.

His.

His tears have stopped now, and he silently watches the man who has finally found his own fairytale. Cinderella and the prince.

He supposes that in a way, he always knew he wouldn’t have the chance to be the prince. He doesn’t know whether to cry again or to laugh or to run and never look back. He doesn’t know, but he understands. He’s never known, but he always understands. He’s never known why it couldn’t be him, but he always understands that he’ll never be the one.

“I’m sorry,” Heechul repeats after a long silence between them, and his voice is cracking.

“Don’t be.” He’s surprised at how steady his voice is.

He doesn’t know why reality is like this, but he understands that people can’t help who their foolish hearts choose to fall in love with.

“I made a mistake,” Heechul says, with a slight tremor in his voice. “I didn’t mean to. I was just distracted and tired, that’s all.”

He looks at the man he loved – loves? He doesn’t know – with soft eyes.

He understands that Heechul is lying, once again.

He understands that Heechul never closed his eyes.

He understands that Heechul pushed him away.

He understands that Heechul was never in love with him, that he never had a chance, not once.

And yet, his foolish heart is aching to take this opportunity, to forgive everything, to be pulled back into Heechul’s warm embrace and his rough kisses and his little nips against the skin. His foolish heart still wants Heechul to run his hands all over his skin, mark him as his, spend nights lost in a tangle of limbs as they once did.

Then, there’s that tiniest part of him, the tiny portion of his mind screaming at him to stop, to run now and stop torturing his foolish heart like this. There’s this one small logical portion in his brain telling him that this twisted fantasy has come to an end, that Heechul has written a fairytale without him inside.

He clings to that part, that small part of sanity.

“Let’s just stay as friends from now on, hyung,” he forces himself to say, even though his foolish heart is shattering into pieces.

He turns his back for the first time.

This time, he’ll be the one to disappear.

His first disappearance will be his last. He’ll disappear like a bubble popping at the surface of the water. He’ll disappear from Heechul’s sight. He’ll run and wait for the scars inflicted deep on his foolish heart to heal.

With his hand on the doorknob, he breathes in deep and swings it open.

And that’s when he comes face-to-face with someone he isn’t quite expecting; somebody who stares at him wide-eyed, jaw almost dropping with shock.

And when he turns and he sees Heechul run to the door, and he sees the mix of emotions on Heechul’s face, it dawns on him and he doesn’t know whether to cry or smile.

So he smiles, holding back the tears that are threatening to fall from his face.

“Jungsoo,” Heechul breathes, “Why are you here?”

He doesn’t know how it happened, but he understands. The pieces of the puzzle have finally assembled; he doesn’t know how anything happened, why anything happened, but he understands.

He understands now who Kim Heechul fell in love with.

Nodding his head to his leader, frozen in place, he exits the apartment. He waits until he gets into his car; it’s then when he allows his foolish heart to shatter once more, and he allows the tears that he’s been holding back to flow down.

Just like that, the last word in the last chapter of his twisted fantasy has been written.

Seven-half; Lee Hyukjae

He wonders how things are going between his leader and Heechul. It’s been a while – a month or so – since Jungsoo had gotten drunk and spilled everything about his feelings towards Heechul.

I wonder if Heechul-hyung realized that he’s in love with Teukie-hyung. He pauses. Would Heechul be able to fall in love? He can only wonder.

He hopes so, though. He hopes that both of them can realize the feelings they share towards one another, he hopes they can be like the prince and princess in fairytales, in their perfect worlds, writing a perfect story together.

He already knows that the things that his hyungs have gone through strayed far from perfect; but at least, hopefully, their stories can intertwine to form a perfect fairytale ending.

He looks down at the book which he holds in his hands, his fingers idly tracing the spine. A children’s classic fairytale, the Little Mermaid.

He laughs quietly to himself, feeling that guilt that creeps over him all over at the thought of his close friend. He’s seen the way Jungsoo looks at Heechul, and he’s seen the way Heechul looks at Jungsoo.

But he’s never missed the way Siwon looks at Heechul either. He knows, he’s aware of the situation. He knows his friend loves Heechul the way Heechul doesn’t love him.

And he feels selfish all of a sudden, because he knows that in hoping that Heechul is happy with somebody else, his friend’s heart will be in so much pain.

In the end, Cinderella married her Prince Charming.

He wonders if Jungsoo will be Heechul’s Prince Charming.

He wonders how this story will play out.

He knows the many possibilities; the first would be if neither admitted to their feelings. It would allow Siwon to live within his own fairytale, and Prince Charming would never find the one with the glass slipper. There would never be a true happily-ever-after.

Or, there could be a happily-ever-after, in which Prince Charming finds the one he loves. If Jungsoo realized how much he needed Heechul, and if Heechul realized what it felt like to be in love for the first time. Cinderella and Prince Charming would have their happily-ever-after, the chapters of their individual stories entwining beautifully to form a fairytale.

But, Hyukjae reflects to himself as he flips to the last page of the Little Mermaid, not all fairytales have happy endings. If Cinderella were to find Prince Charming, where would that leave Siwon? The one who shared a separate story with Heechul, but was never fated to be written into his fairytale.

His eyes, soft and holding a tender sadness to them, read the last line of the Little Mermaid.

Sometimes, in fairytales, someone has to lose their prince and turn into sea foam, disappearing from their sight.