13,800 words

FOUR 

The end-of-school barbecue is in full swing by the time Baekhyun gets there, the only cloud in the sky being the smoke from the grill currently being manned by Sarah Dalton and her children. A white gazebo stands in front of the village hall, shading its large, open double doors and the plastic chairs and tables where people can sit to eat. Mrs Mason is arranging her cakes for dessert and a few other ladies are taking the cling film off bowls of salad and nacho dip, pouring chips onto large serving plates and then babbling in discussion on how to get the chocolate fountain working.

To his left is Kyungsoo’s patio, where his pub opens out onto the village green at the back with recently installed bifold doors. He’s got plastic boxes full of ice and bottled beer, as well as many other beverages, and jugs of juice for the children that they can pour into cups by themselves. Minseok’s children are getting the blackcurrant squash everywhere.

He spots Nessa immediately, the centre of a crowd over near where Yixing is playing songs from his laptop through some expensive-looking speakers, a whole DJ booth set up for him with a karaoke machine and all. Vanessa’s baby bump is a point of interest, everyone asking permission to feel the baby with careful hands while her husband David has his arms around her waist. A constant stream of hugs suggests that the goodbyes have started. Baekhyun must have missed them officially breaking the news.

As his eyes roam the chattering crowd, he comes across Jongin playing tag with the children, the Walkers trying to tame their slobbering great dane who’s lost it at the sight of Agnes’ cat, and Chanyeol surrounded by a group of ladies looking very much like he’s being interrogated. He’s all big smiles and bright eyes again but he keeps shyly messing with his hair, combing the curls this way and that until it’s gone all static. Nevertheless, he doesn’t seem to need saving (yet), so Baekhyun heads over to Kyungsoo at his little pop-up bar and offers him a cheery smile.

“Hey, Baek,” he says in return. “Beer?”

“Please.”

Baekhyun pops a bottle open and leans back against the low stone wall that borders the pub’s outdoor seating area, eyes cast out at all his neighbours bobbing back and forth to talk to each other. Usually there’s some sort of row going on from general disputes but today everyone seems peaceful. No one has stolen someone else’s wheelie bin or cut down a part of their shared hedge between their gardens. Everyone is in good spirit – a good thing where Chanyeol’s concerned, if he plans to befriend them all.

“How are you doing?” Kyungsoo wonders as he mirrors Baekhyun’s posture again the wall, beer in his hand.

“Yeah, not bad,” Baekhyun replies after a sip, tipping his head back.

“I’m sorry about what happened.”

Perhaps the villagers will actually stop saying that in a year or so. “Don’t worry about it. I’m just… trying to learn from it and move on stronger.”

Kyungsoo nods and says nothing else, until Jongin comes striding into view and he gets up to offer him a beer.

“Hi guys! Not joining in the action?” He struggles comically with the bottle opener.

“By action do you mean running around with the kids or being probed for secrets?” Kyungsoo asks dryly behind the spout of his bottle, rousing a laugh from Jongin that’s endearingly genuine.

“Both, I suppose.” He shrugs, admitting defeat and ing his beer into Baekhyun’s hands so he can open it for him. Baekhyun quickly rests his own bottle on the wall beside his hip to do so. “Heard you hung out with the new guy for five hours the other day, Baek.”

Baekhyun glares at Kyungsoo. “I blame you for this.”

“Hey! I didn’t force you to stay until closing time, did I?”

“Wow! Closing time? What exactly were you guys talking about?” Jongin grins from ear to ear as he reaches for his drink back, Baekhyun deliberately holding it out of reach to taunt him. “That’s not fair.” Jongin pouts like a baby and Baekhyun almost gives in. Almost.

“Yeah? Well neither is you all turning nothing into something. That’s not fair either.”

Kyungsoo smirks. “Defensive, are we?”

“You’re the antichrist,” seethes Baekhyun.

“Oh, who’s the antichrist?”

Baekhyun blanches at Chanyeol. How can someone so tall just pop up out of nowhere like that? His arm loses its height and Jongin snatches his beer back, Baekhyun blinking himself into the present while Chanyeol thoughtfully introduces himself to Kyungsoo and Jongin with a formal handshake.

Jongin and Chanyeol’s smiles combined are blinding as they look at each other. “Nice to finally meet you! I live on West Street, just a few doors up from Baekhyun,” Jongin tells, and Kyungsoo pitches in with “I live above the pub.”

“Right! You’re the owner! Awesome place,” Chanyeol compliments with an enthusiastic, if not over the top, nod.

“Beer?” Kyungsoo smiles, handing out another bottle dripping with melted ice.

“Oh, thanks!” Chanyeol holds it with the sleeves of his hoodie brought down past his palms so his hands don’t get wet. Baekhyun stares a little too long at the way his fingertips peek out.

“How are you finding it here?” Kyungsoo asks, somehow making Baekhyun nervous. For some reason, it feels like it’ll be his fault if Chanyeol is finding things unsatisfactory.

Chanyeol nods eagerly, quickly swallowing what beer is in his mouth before he lets out an enthusiastic “Yeah, it’s really great here!” His eyes find Baekhyun’s. “And you were right! Everyone does have some pretty amazing stories to tell.”

“I never lie.” Baekhyun shrugs with a smirk, ignoring the side eyes he gets from Jongin.

“I was just talking to Mrs Parker and a couple of others. They were after my phone number and,” he laughs shyly midway through his sentence, “they got confused when I gave them more than six numbers and started asking me if you can make phone calls from landlines to mobile phones.”

They laugh, though it’s not the first time Baekhyun has heard of the elderly folk being sweetly incompetent with technology. He remembers Old Joe ringing him up and asking him why there was no picture when he put a CD into his DVD player. They begin exchanging stories of the like, Jongin mentioning how he was once cornered by Bill who was shocked that phones had cameras, until they’re disrupted by Kyungsoo saying Junmyeon’s name in surprise.

“Junmyeon! I didn’t know you were coming,” Kyungsoo exclaims. “Beer?”

“No, thanks.” Junmyeon looks smug, holding up the wine bottle he’s got under his arm. “I brought champagne. Anyone want a glass?”

“Kyungsoo’s got us all set on the beer, mate,” Jongin says, to which Junmyeon looks relieved.

“Good. I was only asking to be polite. I brought this bottle for myself.”

His dry humour really cracks Baekhyun up, and he chuckles behind his beer bottle as he watches Chanyeol introduce himself.

“I’m Junmyeon,” the man himself says in return. “I run the hotel at the end of Baekhyun’s road, in the old manor house.”

“He doesn’t mingle with the common folk too often,” Kyungsoo interjects, and they start bickering back and forth about how Junmyeon never comes to the pub quizzes, despite Kyungsoo personally inviting him over the phone at least once a month.

“The hotel keeps me busy,” he protests, and politely answers Jongin’s courteous question on how business is going. He’s experiencing a staff shortage, apparently. Though his establishment is held in high regard, on the precipice of reaching five stars, it’s excessively out of the way of civilisation. Their village, to put it bluntly, is smack bang in the middle of nowhere. The only reason they even have a telephone signal is because Junmyeon himself launched a petition against the local council. People who are willing to drive hours to work every morning down a maze of old country roads are frustratingly hard to come by.

“Oh my god, why did no one tell me Sam was back this weekend?” Jongin gasps, jarringly frozen on his spot before he whirls around to face the wall and starts messing with his hair. Baekhyun casts his eyes out across the field while Kyungsoo says he didn’t know, and finds Samantha Bradley, the daughter of the chemist down the road, stood in a light, floral summer dress with her parents and Mrs Parker. She must be back from university for the summer, Baekhyun reckons, admiring how her long blonde hair catches scenically on the wind when it blows by. Jongin is mad about her, and it’s not hard to see why.

“Jeez—do I look okay?” Jongin panics, staring madly at each member of their group while waiting for confirmation.

“Stop flapping,” Junmyeon mutters with a roll of his eyes. “You look fine. Just go and ask her out, everyone knows you want to.”

“What?! I—No I don’t.”

“Jongin, you’re not discreet at all.” Kyungsoo’s voice flatlines.

Jongin leaves, scathed, and they all exchange knowing glances as he strides directly up to Sam and strikes a conversation. He can’t even look her in the eye, bowing his head, rubbing the back of his neck, shoving his hands in his pockets. She’ll probably misinterpret his advances but she doesn’t look like she hates it, so there’s that.

“So obvious,” Baekhyun and Kyungsoo remark at the same time, sharing a grin.

“So, how long do these things normally last for?” Chanyeol asks, pulling up his sweater sleeve to glance at the large watch wrapped around his wrist. Baekhyun swears he sees some tattoo lines peeking out from under his hoodie, but it could just be a trick of the light.

“Bored already?” Junmyeon quips and Chanyeol’s eyes pop out of his head.

“Oh! No! No! I just want to make sure I have time to talk to everyone, that’s all.” He laughs nervously, cheeks pinking, and Baekhyun comes to his rescue.

“It’ll probably last until around nine-ish. Kids’ bedtime,” he shares, and Chanyeol flashes him a smile that Baekhyun finds contagious. He’s such a friendly guy, wanting to talk to everyone. Baekhyun really admires his social skills.

“Right. In that case, I have more networking to do.” Chanyeol makes quick work of the rest of his beer, stalling for a second because he doesn’t know how to dispose of the empty bottle. Kyungsoo takes it from him with the advice to stay away from Agnes. “Oh,” Chanyeol wraps his arms around himself, “yeah I’ve already had the pleasure of meeting her.”

“I’ll come with you,” Junmyeon decides, trusting Kyungsoo to keep his precious champagne safe behind the wall. “I can introduce you to a few people. Some can be a bit awkward with introductions.”

“Oh, thanks! That sounds great! I’ll meet up with you guys later.”

Baekhyun suppresses the weird feeling that settles across his chest. Identifying it isn’t difficult. Junmyeon is showing Chanyeol around, and for some reason Baekhyun thinks he should be in Junmyeon’s place. But Baekhyun was only ever a way into the village circle. Chanyeol has no obligation to stay tucked under his wing.

He downs the rest of his beer and sets it on the wall beside him, pressing his palms against his elbows in a sort of half-hug. The Vicar comes by and they politely say hello, and as the hour grows later Yixing has to give up his role as DJ so that Old Joe can sing a few songs on his guitar. The kids are still running about, now playing stuck-in-the-mud instead of tag, and Nessa had wormed her way over for a bit to catch a break from the heavy farewells.

“Jen’s been giving me the filthiest looks all evening,” she mutters, pouring herself an orange juice into a small plastic cup. Baekhyun is glad to see that his nail art is holding up well. She’s got a paper plate of typical party food in one hand, balancing the cocktail sausages proving to be a challenge as they keep rolling around, and once she’s downed her juice she starts devouring the cheese and pineapple sticks – of which, there are many.

“I heard from Camilla that she thinks I’m leaving on purpose, and I’m not having any of it. Honestly,” she looks up at both Baekhyun and Kyungsoo, cheeks stuffed like a hamster’s, and talks through a full mouth, “I don’t need the stress.”

“I heard Mike wants custody of the kids,” Kyungsoo points out, which stops Nessa in her tracks.

“Oh god,” she whines, “now I feel awful.”

Baekhyun senses the mood swing a mile off and reaches out to put his arm around her. She leans into him easily, as they’re about the same height, and Baekhyun decides to compliment her on her shampoo to take her mind off things.

“I’ve always been jealous of your hair,” he says calmly, watching as her thick black curls dance in a particularly hard gust of wind. “It’s so long and glossy.”

“I know,” she sniffles.

The three of them talk quietly to each other for a while, enjoying inside jokes and then laughing at Jongin’s expense when they catch him trying to make a move.

“At least Sam doesn’t look disturbed,” Kyungsoo hums, offering Baekhyun another beer shortly after. In reality, Sam looks everything but disturbed. She’s smiling at Jongin and offering him sips of her cider, and even does a twirl when Jongin appears to ask so he can appreciate her dress from all angles. They’re getting on just fine, Jongin growing with confidence the more they interact.

After a while, Baekhyun wanders over to the barbecue and asks for a hotdog that he then drowns in ketchup. He mingles with a few groups of people, subconsciously working his way over to Chanyeol while trying not to look obvious. Chanyeol has his hands wrapped around a cheeseburger in a napkin when he finds him, discussing coding with Junmyeon who says that the hotel’s website needs updating.

“I thought you were a taxi driver, dear,” Agnes asks, putting a hand to her chest in mock shock and clumsily lifting a glass of champagne to her lips. Junmyeon shoots Baekhyun an unhappy stare.

“Oh! Yesterday I got a call from my boss and all our new contracts have gone through, which means more hours and better pay, so I don’t need to be a taxi driver anymore. I just handed in my notice so I’ll be taxi-ing for the next couple of weeks, and then I guess I’ll just be the village taxi for all you guys.”

“You sweet boy,” Agnes fawns, patting his shoulder with a heavily bejewelled hand.

“But how will we know where everyone’s going now?” Camilla, a woman with short blonde hair and a wardrobe full of three-quarter length trousers, asks with a gasp. “It was so useful to know what everyone was getting up to outside of Bybrook.”

Baekhyun smirks when Chanyeol blushes. Sounds like he’s a natural gossip.

“I can still give everyone lifts! A bit of petrol money is always appreciated but not necessary. It’s the least I can do, considering how expensive taxis are. And don’t worry, I’ll keep everyone informed of people’s happenings.” Chanyeol taps his nose to a reception of laughter, and Baekhyun belatedly realises that, yeah, he doesn’t need an in anymore. He seems to have everyone in the palm of his hand already. Baekhyun included.

“Tell you what I heard, though.” Agnes smirks, leaning in towards the middle of their little group as if about to dish out some serious scandal. “Our dear Emily Kim might be pregnant with her’s and Minseok’s third child.”

“Come to think of it, she didn’t have any alcohol when I went up for dinner the other week,” Baekhyun interjects, providing clues so they can better connect all the dots. “And when I ran into Minseok in Rose’s shop he had the weirdest shopping list.”

Everyone seems impressed with his knowledge, and the group reach a consensus that they’ll all keep an eye out. Then again, knowing Agnes she’ll drink one too many at the pub quiz and blurt it out in front of everyone. That’s what happened with Minseok and Emily’s second child.

Just as Baekhyun had predicted, the evening draws to a close around nine o’clock.

“Did you manage to talk to everyone then?” he asks Chanyeol as they prepare to leave, waving goodbye to those already departing the green and heading for home.

“I did, actually!” Chanyeol looks pleased. “I even met Agnes’ cat.”

Baekhyun snorts. “Do you know why he’s called Dugly?”

“No, why?”

“Because he’s damn ugly.”

Chanyeol stops his lazy pace, gawping at Baekhyun. “Are you serious?”

“Course not.” Baekhyun simpers. “But we do call Joe ‘Old Joe’ because he’s old like I told you, that’s a village thing. He told me might go back to his playboy days if he’s not frequently reminded of his age.

Apparently his mind is only twenty-one.”

“Playboy days?”

“Don’t ask.”

After what Mrs Parker said yesterday, Baekhyun finds himself hesitant to walk Chanyeol home again. People are still milling about the village centre, some filing into the pub, others further down the road playing in the river that runs under the main road. People will see them, and they’ll talk, and they’ll theorize, and Baekhyun realises how much of a damned hypocrite he is for not wanting people to make rumours about him when he’s helping build one about Minseok and Emily. Still, he has a particular affection for newborn babies and can’t wait to help babysit on date nights.

“I was wondering,” Chanyeol starts, veering up towards his home. Baekhyun has no choice but to follow. “Do you fancy having dinner again at some point?”

Don’t look too far into it. “Sure! That’d be great!”

♡♡♡

Baekhyun stares long and hard at the canvas he’s chosen to paint next. He’s sanded it down to make it smooth and has positioned it securely on his easel. All that’s left to do is wring his brain for ideas and inspiration. He contemplated opening up commissions for a while, then decided against it. Reason being, he can’t trust himself to create someone else’s vision and do it perfectly. He has opened up his shop again, though, and had a trickle of orders come through. It’s less than he was hoping for but he’s been out of the loop for a while in regards to social media. More teasers on Tumblr and some new advertisements on Twitter should do the trick, and Baekhyun even spares a few minutes updating his LinkedIn profile that’s gathering dust and covered in ivy by now. He was never one for the corporate world.

The phone rings downstairs but he can’t take his eyes off the blankness in front of him for a while. He tries to imagine lines and of colour, waiting for an image of some kind to materialise in his head. It doesn’t prove to be successful, so he hurries downstairs to pick up the phone before it’s last ring and finds Mrs Parker on the other end of the line.

“Baekhyun, dear! I thought you’d gone out.”

“Nope, still here,” he chuckles.

He hears her laugh gently and smiles. “Well, me and the rest of the village council were thinking of doing a film screening out on the village green. The weather looks like it’s going to be good! It’ll be the hottest day of the year tomorrow so far, as the weather lady put it. Anyway, we decided on Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, something kid-friendly that we can all enjoy too. Joseph says he has a projector we can use but I don’t particularly have high hopes for that.”

“That sounds lovely! I’ll be there.”

“Great! It’s happening tomorrow at seven. And will you let Chanyeol know for me?”

Baekhyun’s stomach flips. “Of course! No problem at all.”

“Alright then! I’ll speak to you soon! And come down for tea this afternoon, dear. You need a break.”

Grabbing his sketchbook on the way out of the door, he heads to the tea room straight away.

The film screening itself is much more civilised than the barbecue; the children hiss at the adults every time they talk over the movie so there’s no time to gossip as they normally would. They all gather on the grass on a wide array of blankets – Baekhyun brought his favourite tartan one that he decides to share with Chanyeol – with drinks and snacks around their feet. Chanyeol brought beer and popcorn, which Baekhyun gladly shares.

They pause midway through the film for a toilet break, the line out the door as everyone heads for Kyungsoo’s pub toilets specifically. It allows Baekhyun to have some breathing room – or talking room – and he is finally able to turn to Rose sitting beside him and ask her how she’s doing. She and Yixing are leaning into each other, arms wrapped around waists and shoulders and random kisses placed impulsively on whatever skin is closest. Baekhyun’s heart is struck with hot jealousy, so he tries to ignore the way Yixing nuzzles into her neck while they’re talking. He feels like he’s interrupting.

“Jongdae has a new conquest, you know.” Rose grins, easing Yixing off her side with such grace that it doesn’t come across as rude. “The girl from the farm that shares the same border with his.”

“Oh?”

“Jongdae says she was looking for some missing sheep and he suggested that she come and check his flock. When they still couldn’t find them, he helped her search all day.”

“Did they find them?” Chanyeol asks, leaning towards the conversation with great interest.

Rose nods, sipping her J2O from the bottle through a straw. “Someone had left the gate open on her land. The sheep got out that way and apparently a fox did the rest.”

“They’re a pain in the ,” Yixing grumbles. “I lost seven sheep to them last year alone.”

“Something good came out of it though,” Rose smiles, leaning back on her palms. “Jongdae’s got a date.”

Jongdae himself is sitting nearest to the screen with Minseok, Minseok’s children repeatedly standing up to get closer to the chocolate whenever it appears on screen and blocking the projection for everyone else.

“I’m glad he’s found someone,” Baekhyun says softly. “It’s about time,” he adds.

“He’s only twenty-nine!” Rose cries. “Besides, we should all be meeting her soon. Minseok’s told him to invite her to the Sunday roast.”

For the remainder of the movie, they lapse back into silence. They laugh when it’s funny, breathe shakily when it’s sad, and smile with understanding when Emily has to leave because Lucas won’t stop squawking. Baekhyun puts his palms back and rests on them, raking the movie for inspiration and getting into the story when he feels something against his hand.

He jolts away instantly, snapping his head to the side to find a surprised Chanyeol peering back at him.

“Sorry,” Chanyeol whispers, inching away slightly so that their hands won’t touch by accident again.

Though Baekhyun smiles and tells him that it’s fine, he can’t shake the weird feeling that’s pressing down on his chest. He repositions himself to sit with his legs crossed and puts his hands in his lap like he’s back in primary school and wonders why he feels so uncomfortable all of a sudden. His skin feels tingly and strangely numb, and a cold flush has swept across his cheeks and down his neck. Chanyeol didn’t mean to touch him. It was an accident. But Baekhyun gets entombed in his own head all the same.

He doesn’t walk Chanyeol home after, even though he can tell he feels really guilty without really needing to. That makes Baekhyun feel worse, so he heads home and throws himself back into his work for the next couple of days. He deals with the prints that have been ordered, slipping them into envelopes and then writing names and addresses on the front in marker pen. He’ll have to get some postage stamps from Rose tomorrow so he can send them off in time.

He’ll occasionally get a phone call from someone looking for an outlet. Mrs Mason tells him all about a man Martha had over last night. Sarah Daulton, Martha’s neighbour, could hear everything through the wall. “And that’s the adjoining wall to her seven-year old’s bedroom!”

Samantha and Jongin have also been sighted – as if they’re wanted criminals – in the pub. Kyungsoo took pictures for blackmail and Joe marched through the door with a violin demanding to know where the lovebirds were. It makes Baekhyun sad that he’s missing all of this. He can blame it on work all he wants but he knows deep down that he’s deliberately isolating himself. Ever since Chanyeol touched his hand he’s been struggling to look at him in the same way. It’s unsettling, both because he doesn’t know what it means and because it probably doesn’t mean anything. He’s blowing this way out of proportion.

He just feels so tense. So uptight. Not even a scented bubble bath manages to unwind him like it normally does. While lying idle in the water, he remembers the bottle of wine he never opened that he received as a gift at his first (and only) gallery show. Swift of the towel have him dry enough not to drip all over his carpet, and he heads downstairs in his birthday suit, figuring that drinking wine might somehow be liberating.

Actually, it’s just cold.

He continues with his Christmas cards the next day, roughly completing the first drafts of four more. There’s something missing from them though, no matter how hard he tries to translate joy into his designs. His chest feels relatively hollow and he fills a hot water bottle and lies with it against his collar bones, hoping that the warmth will revitalise the cowering happiness that has scampered so far away inside himself that he can’t find it anymore. He doesn’t feel like eating dinner, so instead he pours himself another glass of wine and then heads out to take a short evening walk around the edges of Minseok’s fields.

Drinking on an empty stomach is never a good idea, especially not with his low alcohol tolerance, but it makes him feel lighter. The tree roots do prove to be a little tricky here and there, and he laughs as he scares rabbits into their burrows when he comes bounding through the ferns. The feeling doesn’t last though, and by the time he’s back in the village he feels the same as he did before. Hollow. Empty. Numb in parts.

For a start, he should probably eat some proper food, so he nips back home to pick up his wallet and makes way for the pub, stopping at the side of the road to let Yixing rumble past in a tractor with tyres the height of Baekhyun’s shoulders.

“Hey, Baek!” Yixing calls down, slowing to a stop in the middle of the fork where Baekhyun’s road joins the main road.

“Hey, Yixing.”

“Have you eaten yet? Rose is making ham pasta.”

Baekhyun smiles faintly, something coming back to life in his spirit, and then he awkwardly hauls himself up to sit beside Yixing in the tractor, grimacing when he hears a pointed rip and suddenly the cool metal of the seat is touching his inner thigh.

“Dammit,” he mutters, attracting Yixing’s attention. “They were on their last legs anyways.” It was one large step for Baekhyun-kind getting up here, but that didn’t mean his jeans had to flake on him and rip in one of the worst places possible.

“Rose’ll patch them up for you.” Yixing nudges him jovially, and his engine splutters back to life.

It’s a pleasant evening, just with slightly raunchier conversation than he’s used to. Once Yixing cracks out the beer, Baekhyun is done for, and he cries several drinks in when he realises that he’s probably going to throw up the delicious meal Rose cooked for them all. He stays the night in the end, set up on the futon in the spare room with a bright yellow duvet set.

When he wakes up, he can hear something cooking in the kitchen, but stops himself in the doorway at the sight of them back hugging and exchanging sweet kisses over the frying pan. Jealousy stings in his eyes and his heart trembles ‘til it’s cold; he loathes himself for his inability to be happy for other people when it comes to things like this.

At the root of everything, despite all the villagers and all the activities they get up to, he thinks loneliness has something to do with it. It’s not like Sehun was ever here when they were together. They never cooked breakfast together or laughed about their funny stories at dinner with friends – Baekhyun had tried not to be concerned last night when Rose said she hurt her head and went faint from trying to get it on with Yixing in the tractor, the very same they drove up in.

In hindsight, he and Sehun never did what a typical couple would do. Or, dare he think it, a real couple. They probably never would have either. With two hours and hundreds of miles between them, they would never have been able to kiss each other every morning before work or get frisky without forward planning and scheduling. And… that’s not what Baekhyun wants. He wants what Rose and Yixing have. What Minseok and Emily have and what Mr and Mrs Parker have. So maybe things are better this way.

He starts walking more, enjoying the peace and quiet and, surprisingly, being by himself. One morning, he even gets carried away and walks a longer route than normal, cutting across one of Minseok’s fields and treading uphill to where he shares a wall with Yixing’s lower paddock. He stops for a moment to feed the horses long pieces of grass that he pulls from the ground, tucking his thumb beneath his palm like his grandparents always taught him to in case the horse bites it off. He smiles and waves the flies off their eyelids, before he walks further over the crest of the hill and has to dodge sheep poo on his way back.

Mrs Parker welcomes him warmly when he steps in for some lunch, ordering himself a bacon sandwich and a cup of tea that comes in its own teapot. He smiles at the design printed on the side, one of his own paintings that he did of Bybrook from the top of Yixing’s farm.

“Are you a fan, Mrs Parker?” he calls, voice carrying across the tearoom and through the archway that leads into the kitchen, the same archway that her head pops around a few seconds later. She’s cleaning the frying pan she’s just used, a tea cloth in her hand that she holds up to the light to show off another one of Baekhyun’s contractual works.

“I’m your number one fan, my dear. Don’t underestimate me.”

He leaves a little before lunchtime to head home and get some work done, about to head down his road when he sees Chanyeol walking into Old Joe’s house further up the lane. For some reason, his feet stop moving, and he stands there looking at where Chanyeol was before he walked through Joe’s front door like he’s in some kind of a trance. It’s only been a few days since he last saw him and spoke to him, but Baekhyun might have forgotten what he looked like. Just a little.

Or rather, forgot how good he looked.

The van that’s parked outside Joe’s house is from the supermarket, his food delivery being ferried into his kitchen by Chanyeol and the driver in large branded crates. His eyes latch onto Chanyeol’s bare forearms when he catches dark lines, and upon closer inspection (as he ambles towards them), he realises they’re tattoos.

It feels like a fish is flopping around in his stomach, somewhat. Baekhyun can’t understand why, but it gets worse when Chanyeol spots his approach and flashes him a smile.

“Need a hand?” Baekhyun asks, and proceeds to help Joe store his food away in his kitchen. The fridge feels colder than normal when he gets to putting the milk inside. Chanyeol always wears large hoodies and jumpers. Baekhyun didn’t expect him to be so sculpted underneath, with his t-shirt showing it off for all to see.

Joe is happy to see him, claps an arm around his shoulders and calls him a ‘good lad’. He puts the kettle on just as Baekhyun and Chanyeol are finishing up