O.o o.O

“Is something wrong?” 

“Yes. No.” Sehun scowled, poking angrily at the boba in his bubble tea. “It’s nothing.”

Jongin was never one to pry, so he shrugged, even though Sehun was the one that had insisted on meeting that day. “Okay.”

The two of them sat in a comfortable silence, Jongin scrolling through his phone as Sehun continued stabbing at boba. 

“I saw Luhan yesterday,” Sehun admitted quietly, after about ten minutes.

Jongin choked on his bubble tea, spraying some of it across the table and the rest of it dribbling down his chin.

Sehun wrinkled his nose delicately. “Ew.”

“Shut up,” Jongin muttered, grabbing at the napkins set on their table. “Luhan-hyung? Seriously?”

Sehun had his head down, eyes averted. “Yeah.” A pause. “And he’s not our hyung,” he said angrily, stabbing the boba even more viciously than before as his voice dropped into a murmur. “Not after what he did.”

Jongin sighed. He knew there was no point in talking to Sehun when it was about Luhan. “So how did you see him again?” he asked instead. “Did you say hi?”

“He was waiting for me after work,” Sehun mumbled. 

“He what?” Jongin straightened in his seat. “How did he even find you?”

Sehun shrugged. “Dunno.” He really didn’t. He didn’t like mixing his private and professional lives, his social media accounts were restricted to a small number of friends only, and his company website didn’t have personnel information anywhere.

“That’s…kinda scary, to be honest,” Jongin said. “The only thing that hasn’t changed is your phone number. Maybe…”

“I don’t know. Whatever.” Sehun shook his head. “If he waits for me at work again, I can just ignore him.”

“You won’t talk to him?”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Sehun mumbled. 

“Well…you could ask him why he left,” Jongin said delicately.

“What does it matter anymore. He abandoned me, Jongin. He -” Sehun pressed his lips together for a moment to collect himself. “He broke my heart.”

“I know,” Jongin reached across the small table to hold Sehun’s forearm. “But maybe he had a good reason.”

“What reason could it be to just disappear?” Sehun said harshly.

“Okay, well not a good reason, but a reason,” Jongin said. “Just think about it, hm?”

Sehun said nothing, going back to stabbing at boba, but Jongin sat back anyway, satisfied that he had appeased Sehun’s ire somewhat.

O.o o.O

It took all of Sehun’s courage, but he did it, sitting there on Luhan’s couch, hands clenched into fists in his lap and shoulders tense. “Hannie-hyung, I like you. I’m in love with you.”

When no response came, Sehun’s lower lip trembled as he looked up at Luhan standing there in front of him, gazing down at him with the same softness that was so familiar to him now after two years.

“Oh, Sehunnie,” Luhan sighed out, and Sehun sniffled, feeling the backs of his eyes start to prickle with tears. 

He should’ve known. He sort of already knew - Luhan was good-looking and smart and rich and so, so cool - there was no way he’d like an awkward, gangly high-schooler that was more lost in life than anything else. 

“Oh, Sehunnie,” Luhan said again, sitting down next to Sehun and reaching over to hold one of Sehun’s hands in both of his own. “I’m happy you feel that way about me. I really am.”

“But you don’t like me like that,” Sehun mumbled. His chest hurt. Was this heartbreak?

Luhan sighed. “Sehunnie…”

Sehun sniffled some more, horrifically embarrassed as a couple tears spilled over onto his cheeks. 

“Oh, my Sehunnie,” Luhan murmured, bringing Sehun into a hug, letting Sehun rest his head on his shoulder. “My beautiful Sehunnie, please don’t cry anymore.”

“I’m not,” Sehun said petulantly, though the sleeves of his school cardigan were now soaked through.

“My beautiful Sehunnie.” Luhan’s voice was gentle as he through Sehun’s hair. “You’re still so young…”

“Is that it?” Sehun lifted his head, face red and splotchy. “Because you think I’m just a kid?”

“You’re only seventeen,” Luhan said, tucking away a lock of Sehun’s hair behind his ear. He still wore the same soft look, lips pulling into a wistful smile. “And I’m much, much older than you.”

“You’re not that much older.” Sehun wiped his nose with his sleeve, and Luhan’s smile widened fondly before reaching for a tissue from the box on the coffee table and wiping Sehun’s nose for him. As far as Sehun knew, Luhan was a student at the nearby university, so at the absolute most he was probably twenty-three?

“Old enough.”

Sehun scrunched his face up. “I’m not a kid,” he pouted.

“You’re not,” Luhan acquiesced, dabbing at Sehun’s wet face. “But you’re only seventeen. You still have so much of your life to live.”

“But I want to live it with you.”

Luhan was quiet for some time, eyes roving over Sehun’s baby-soft features. “Sehunnie, it’s not that hyung doesn’t want to be with you. But I don’t want you to look back and feel like you’ve missed out on anything.”

“I wouldn’t,” Sehun said stubbornly. 

Luhan’s smile was so terribly, terribly sad. “My beautiful Sehunnie, do you trust in what I say?”

Sehun pouted, knowing what Luhan was saying. “Yes, but-”

“I have many regrets.” Luhan thumbed at the drying tear tracks on Sehun’s cheek. “There are so many things I wish I could have done, could have experienced, but it’s all too late for me now.”

Sehun frowned. “Why?”

“Just like you can’t go back in time, you can’t go back and redo what you’ve missed. Once that time has passed, it’s gone.” Luhan pinched the tip of Sehun’s nose. “Even you know that.”

Sniffling again, Sehun wilted under Luhan’s melancholic gaze. “But I really, really like you,” he said in a tiny voice.

“My beautiful Sehunnie. Listen to hyung, and give it a few years. Go out, finish your schooling, get a job, fall in love, over and over again if you need to. Maybe you’ll meet someone and get married. Maybe you’ll have kids. Maybe…”

“I’ll never love again,” Sehun said tearfully, with all the wilfulness of a seventeen year-old boy. “Not unless it’s you.”

Luhan the underside of Sehun’s chin gently. “My beautiful Sehunnie. If you do what hyung says, and at the very end, after those few years, you still decide you want to be with me, then we’ll be together.”

Sehun perked up immediately. “Really?”

“But hyung takes these things very seriously, you know.”

Sehun nodded. In his two years of knowing Luhan, never once had he dated, never mind been in a relationship. 

“If you want to be with me, it must be for ever.”

A forever with Luhan. That didn’t sound so bad. 

Sehun blew his nose into a tissue. “If I do what you say, we can be together?”

“In a few years. After you’ve lived your life to the fullest. So promise me, Sehunnie. Promise me you’ll try.”

Sehun nodded, resolute. “I promise.”

Luhan smiled again, soft and fond like always. “Good.” He leaned in, cupping Sehun’s face in both hands to press a kiss to his forehead.

Luhan sat back in his seat, running the pads of his thumbs over Sehun’s cheekbones as Sehun sniffled some more, eyes bright as he smiled back at him.

Ah, his Sehunnie was so beautiful.

O.o o.O

Luhan stepped out of the shadows. “Sehunnie.”

Sehun looked over his shoulder and froze, more than a little drunk as he swayed dangerously on his feet. “Hannie-hyung?” The old pet name spilled out, unbidden, but was immediately forgotten by Sehun as he hiccupped. “What?” What do you want, he wanted to say. How did you find me? Why are you here?

“Sehunnie,” Luhan said, just as fond as ever even as Sehun clapped a hand over his mouth, bending over and shoulders shaking as he held back his vomit.

“Go ‘way,” Sehun mumbled, before swallowing hard again, teetering towards the lobby of his apartment building.

“Oh, my Sehunnie,” Luhan said, one strong arm around Sehun’s waist as he led them into the building. “You shouldn’t drink so much.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Sehun slurred out. “‘M grown.”

“Yes you are,” Luhan said, propping Sehun against himself as they entered the elevator. “My beautiful Sehunnie, all grown up.”

“Go ‘way.” Sehun shoved Luhan as the elevator doors opened on his floor, and he tumbled against a wall as he made his way to his front door. 

Luhan held Sehun upright again, waiting patiently as Sehun keyed in his passcode and entered his flat. Sehun would have fallen over immediately, as he had done multiple times, but this time there was Luhan holding him up with just one arm, even as he bent over to pull off Sehun’s shoes.

“Go ‘way,” Sehun said again, giving one last pathetic shove at Luhan, but really it was more to propel himself into the flat. “Why’re you here?”

“Oh, my Sehunnie,” Luhan said, as Sehun stumbled towards his bedroom, stripping himself mindlessly of his clothing. “I came back for you.”

Sehun didn’t hear, flopping face down into his bed, breathing heavily and wearing nothing other than his boxer shorts. 

“You want some water, Sehunnie?”

It took great effort, but Sehun somehow managed to open his eyes. “Hannie-hyung?”

Luhan smiled, a hand through Sehun’s hair, pushing away the fringe before his eyes. “Yes, Sehunnie. Hannie-hyung is here.”

“Why’d you leave?” Sehun mumbled, eyes tearing up. “Why’d you leave me?”

“Oh, my beautiful Sehunnie.” Luhan again through Sehun’s hair. “Hyung will tell you when you wake up.”

“Did you ever love me?” Sehun sniffled, looking so, so young with his pout and glossy eyes, seventeen all over again as he confessed his love to Luhan.

“I did. I have. I always have,” Luhan said. “I still do.”

Sehun sniffled again, before closing his eyes with a sigh. “Don’t leave. Don’t leave me.”

Luhan waited a while as Sehun’s breath evened out before he leaned in, pressing a soft kiss to Sehun’s heated forehead.

Ah, his Sehunnie was still so beautiful.

O.o o.O

 

 

 

 

 

A/N: omg what am i doing?!?!?!?!?