[title song: remember - katie]
[~20k]

two

Sunhye isn’t quite sure why she feels so jittery, almost nervous, when she introduces Baekhyun to Irene. Irene looks as cold as ever, eyes judging, protective almost, as she crosses her arms over her chest and scrutinizes Baekhyun for a long time. Sunhye remembers Irene's face when Sunhye had offhandedly mentioned Baekhyun buying groceries and medicine to her a couple weeks ago. Five minutes later, Irene had implied that she should invite Baekhyun to Taeyong's party, a look on her face that reminded Sunhye of the look her mother would have whenever Sunhye pretended like she had thawed whatever meat her mother asked her to take out of the freezer hours ago, when in reality, she remembered to do it when she saw her mother entering the gates practically thirty seconds ago. It's a look of skepticism that is ingrained into Sunhye's subconscious.

Baekhyun shuffles a bit, she notices, his hand tangling in the hair at the nape of his neck as he gives Irene a sheepish smile. It’s the first time she’s seen him fiddling like that. It’s cute. She fights off the smile.

A long moment passes until Irene blinks at Baekhyun, once, twice, three times, before she finally says, tone neutral and eyes meeting Sunhye's, “I wasn’t expecting your sugar daddy to look like this.”

“Sugar daddy?” Sunhye sputters, choking on air.

Baekhyun, on the other hand, is utterly amused, his eyes twinkling as a grin spreads across his cheeks.

Yixing makes a face, “More like her sugar uncle.”

Baekhyun’s grin drops and he scowls at Yixing, though there’s nothing quite venomous or angry about his glare—there is a soft sort of fondness in his eyes that she sees in all her friend’s eyes when they speak to Yixing. It’s strange because she expects irritation there; Baekhyun has certainly been arguing and ragging on Yixing enough lately for her to suspect that they have some kind of problem with each other, though they never bother telling her what it is. The other time she asked Yixing separately after the grocery trip he had just shrugged nonchalantly and said, Mario Kart makes things tense.

Irene glances from Sunhye to Yixing to Baekhyun, eyes flickering back and forth so fast Sunhye’s afraid it’ll induce a headache. Sunhye gulps down half her margarita before she mutters, at the same time as Baekhyun and Yixing, “What?”

Irene just snorts, though her shoulders seem to relax and that mom-ish look melts a bit, “Nothing. Let’s just get to the table. Taeyong got bottle service.”

And then Irene hooks an arm through the crook of Sunhye’s elbow and practically drags her through the club, Yixing and Baekhyun trailing after them.

“‘Nothing,’ my .” Sunhye hisses into Irene’s ear, brows rising. “What are you thinking?”

“About how Taeyong’s wasted agreed to pay for everyone’s drinks so I’m about to buy the most expensive tequila shots on the menu.” Irene responds, nonchalantly, though her red-painted lips are pulled into a -eating grin that Sunhye absolutely does not trust. Sober Irene is nice and sweet, though a little bit sarcastic and always one to speak her mind. But, Drunk Irene? She’s one hundred and sixty-two centimeters of pure chaotic evil.

Still, Sunhye doesn’t want to know. So she just gives Irene what she hopes is her most stern don’t do anything too crazy look before she says, “Well, if Taeyong’s buying then I’m down.”

They sidle into the private booth near the back of the club, squeezing through a wall of bodies until they reach the sight of Taeyong clinking glasses with a very amused Kang Seulgi, Kim Jongin, and Johnny Seo crowding him. Taeyong’s eyes practically sparkle with excitement when he spots them, downing his shot before he throws his arms around both Irene and Sunhye at once, half lifting them into the air as he attempts and fails at twirling, nearly falling over in the process.

“Happy birthday, Tae.” Sunhye laughs, patting him on the head as she steadies him. He unlatches himself and throws himself at Yixing and Baekhyun—he’s clearly too drunk to care that he doesn’t even know Baekhyun well enough to latch onto him that way. Baekhyun doesn’t seem to mind, patting Taeyong’s back without thinking. It’s strange to her, because she’s always thought Baekhyun didn’t appreciate any platonic touching—it’s why she refrained from doing so, because she’s afraid he’ll literally bite her head off. But then again, he and Yixing are always pressed up against each other during their Mario Kart matches.

Irene turns to Seulgi, shouting over the music, “Is everyone here?”

Seulgi nods, her yeah almost inaudible because of the pumping bass reverberating all around them. Seulgi gestures to the dancefloor, not bothering to hide her grin. Sunhye glimpses Wendy dancing wildly, arms flailing above her head while she bends in half and flops around, looking the very opposite of y, despite her dance moves. Sunhye giggles at how flustered Jaehyun looks, since he’s seemingly stuck in between a krumping Wendy and a flailing Taeil who looks like he’s made it his sole mission to outdo Wendy’s dance moves.

Seulgi shakes her head, “Yeah, so let’s all agree we don’t know either of them.”

“Shouldn’t someone save Jaehyun, though?” Jongin slurs out loudly.

They all glance at each other before they shrug. "It looks dangerous." Sunhye says.

Johnny snorts, “Eh, he can handle it.”

Sunhye laughs as Johnny takes a snapchat, tilting his phone in her direction so she can see him send the photo to Cha Eunwoo (and Jaehyun just so he’ll know they’ve seen everything whenever he next checks his phone) with the caption this could have been u and jaehyun but ur playing. Eunwoo responds immediately with a zoomed in snap of his eye and eyebrows (which is also ridiculously beautiful, like the rest of him, unfortunately) and the caption, god tbh I wish that (jaehyun) were me. he's not even appreciating that legendary sandwich he’s standing between. Johnny takes a horribly ugly snap of both Sunhye and him staring down at the camera, flash blinding, quadruple chins protruding, and responds, sunhye says ur a hoe. Sunhye smacks Johnny’s arm, exclaiming don’t bring me into this! Johnny just ignores her, snickering at his phone, before he shows her Eunwoo’s response. She momentarily distracted by the fact that despite him making an ugly face with at least five chins down his neck, he still manages to look handsome. It’s truly not fair and she will never be able to fathom how someone could be blessed with such good looks. Then she reads his response, at least i don’t have a boyfriend AND a sugar daddy.

Sunhye smacks Johnny harder because she can’t smack Eunwoo and Johnny cackles, falling back into Seulgi and Taeyong, who are both drunk enough to not care, Seulgi kindly steadying him before Taeyong wraps himself around Johnny, clinging like he usually does when he’s drunk.

Sunhye watches them for a moment, half-wondering why the hell everyone seems to think she has a sugar daddy. How in the world did all her friends find out about Baekhyun and her strange friendship-slash-relationship with him so quickly? Is Baekhyun…does he really come off as something like that for her? Why can’t they just take what he’s offering her and Yixing at face value like normal people would? 

(A small voice at the back of her head reminds her that Baekhyun's whatever-he's-doing isn't exactly normal. He's a vampire, first of all.)

She turns away, gulping down the rest of her drink just as another round of shots are brought over, courtesy of Taeyong. She looks up and she sees Baekhyun sitting in the booth, Yixing leaning back against the table. Baekhyun is peering at her, the strangest, oddly penetrating look in his eyes as he watches her interact with her friends. There is an inkling of what she thinks may be fascination there, in his eyes, and something else, something she can’t ever figure out, something she guesses comes with the extra decades a vampire gets to build impenetrable walls around their emotions. She watches as he speaks to Yixing, hand over his mouth as he leans close to whisper in Yixing’s ear each time, and Yixing is nodding, smiling slightly, gaze lingering on Baekhyun. Her stomach churns a bit at the sight.

(For a moment, she feels almost…forgotten. By not just Yixing, but also Baekhyun. Especially when Baekhyun tears his eyes off her voice to say something to Yixing that has him throwing his head back, giggling in the cute way of his she loves so much. Baekhyun rolls his eyes at Yixing’s response, but that fond look from earlier? It’s still there. It’s still there and still lingering whenever he meets Yixing’s gaze. She can’t see Yixing’s eyes in the darkness of the club, especially not at this angle nor from this distance, but she can imagine the way his eyes might light up cutely, the little dimple forming whenever he graces Baekhyun with a smile. She can imagine the kindness blooming in his expression, intermingling so effortlessly with mischief.

She’s never been a jealous person, but what frightens her most, right then and there, is not the fact that she feels a little (read: very) miffed that Yixing isn’t paying attention to her. It’s the fact that irritation courses through her because neither is Baekhyun. It’s frightening. She is frightened of the little green monster roaring deep in the depths of her stomach. She is frightened that it doesn’t necessarily bother her that Baekhyun’s the one who Yixing’s paying more attention to or vice versa. It just bothers her that she’s not a part of it. It frightens her that she is so greedy. She blinks, rapidly, because she sounds so ing selfish and greedy and…horrible.

She is horrible.)

Hands land on her waist and she is jerked out of her thoughts, vision swimming for a moment from all the tequila shots catching up to her. Someone rocks their hips against hers, pressing close, and she can feel her body recoiling. She can’t quite recognize the face. She looks up at him, squinting, though she knows this man is not the man (one of the men?) she wants to see. She doesn’t know him. He’s a stranger and she doesn’t want him anywhere near her.

She easily breaks away from his hold, shaking her head while she mouths a firm no. The man does not let up. He steps into her space, eyes drooping from one drink too many, mouthing something that must be an attempt to placate her. She can’t hear it over the pulsing bass quivering through the club, engulfing her thoughts for a moment, settling under her skin. The man is like a leech; no matter how far she shuffles away, he clings, pressing further against her. She glances around her, because she was positive her friends are just a couple of feet away—Yixing and Baekhyun were just here—but then she remembers that they’re also drunk and maybe might be preoccupied. She remembers Irene and Seulgi had said they were going to pee a few minutes ago, while she was talking to Johnny, leaving her with him. She isn’t sure where Johnny went. He might have finally taken pity on Jaehyun. She glances over her shoulder and it takes a long minute of her turning away from the man and him deciding he’ll just dance at her back, sweaty hands landing on her hips while she searches the dim club, before she finally manages to make eye contact with Jongin.

Jongin’s dancing with a pretty, tiny girl with slanted eyes and full lips, their grinding a little too obscene for a public place, though Sunhye’s not one to judge, because to each their own—but, thankfully, he notices her distress, murmurs something in the ear of the girl , causing her to nod immediately, before untangling himself. She starts to feel bad for interrupting Jongin, but then the stranger fingers the hem of her shirt, fingers brushing bare skin. Her guilt at bothering Jongin disappears the moment she feels sweaty hands on her skin. Sunhye usually hates confrontation—she really does—but when she’s drunk, all inhibitions are thrown out the window and she tends to become the instigator of her friend group. And when she, or any of her friends, are touched without consent, she always gets very angry and very defensive. She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, and then grabs the man’s fingers and roughly shoves him away, swiveling to face him.

“I said no.” She snaps, voice thankfully penetrating the pounding club music just enough for it to go through his thick skull.

The man tilts his head, hands in the air, placating again, as if he’s being kind, as if he’s playing nice and she’s the one acting out and making a scene. She scowls at him. His lips move, forming what she thinks might be come on, baby. We were just dancing.

She has half a mind to punch him. She only rethinks the action because she doesn’t want Taeyong to get kicked out of the club on his birthday. Maybe she can stomp on his toes instead?

Before she can decide, someone sidles in beside her, grabbing her hand and tugging her away from the man without a word. She knows exactly who it is before she even looks up at him, because his hand is a comforting familiarity she’s spent years committing to memory. But, when she looks up at him, Yixing’s eyes are not on her, gaze pinned on the man who had been bothering her even as he walks her away, rubbing her back soothingly as he does so. The stranger doesn’t reach out to her, doesn’t tug her back by her waist or wrist, doesn’t leech onto her. He just instantly backs off after meeting Yixing’s narrowed gaze. It has her fuming. She thinks it’s bull. Why can’t they listen to her? Why do they only back off when another man shows up? It’s ing bull.

She doesn’t realize she’s being seated at the booth, doesn’t realize she’s speaking her thoughts out loud, exclaiming, that’s ing bullshit, over and over, why can't they treat me like my own ing person interspersed in there, until she notices Yixing pushing her a water bottle into her hands, suddenly looming over her.

"I'm sorry you have to deal with that, love." Yixing says, sighing. He looks as mad as she feels and she warms a bit.

She sways to the side, away from Yixing, just to look up at him, and her back bumps into a cool body. She jolts, turning, and blinks rapidly at how close Baekhyun’s face is to her.

Yixing leans down, his eyes level with hers as he unscrews the water bottle in her hands.

Baekhyun says, “Drink it already.”

Her heart feels like it’ll jump out of her chest at how close Baekhyun sounds, how his low voice rumbles right against her ear. Her heart flutters, anger dissipating quickly, because of how close they both are. She swears her heart will drop right out of her at the way it both flutters and seizes because she’s smushed between two very handsome boys, one of whom she loves very, very much and another who is—he’s cute and she likes him a little, despite who he, but also the guilt skitters across her skin, makes her sweat, makes her want to slip under the booth table and disappear into the ground, because how could she have the audacity to feel this way about another person with her boyfriend right there? What is wrong with her?

“She doesn’t look like she’s breathing.”

“.” A hand drags through her hair, pushing it back out of her eyes. “Sunhye, love, are you feeling all right?”

She jolts out of her thoughts and very nearly rolls off the booth seats and under the table because she is currently slumped against Baekhyun, his shoulder pressed along her spine, while Yixing kneels on the booth, fingers in her hair as he cups her face and peers at her. She yelps, jumping. Her head hits something hard and she hears a low .

She straightens up, pulling away from Baekhyun’s side, ignoring the small voice in her head that laments the loss of contact, and she exclaims, over the music, “I’m fine!” She reaches up, patting Yixing’s cheek, quickly tacking on, “I’m fine. I just need a drink, I think.”

Or five, she thinks, her heart still pumping so hard in her chest. She wonders if this is how she’ll die—of heart failure in a ty club.

Yixing blinks at her and it’s adorable. She nearly coos, despite the guilt eating her alive. Yixing’s gaze slides over her shoulder. Someone—it’s Baekhyun, idiot, she knows it’s Baekhyun—just gives her back a friendly pat, palm lingering for an extra moment. Yixing slowly descends from the booth, hand still pressed to the booth table, fingers gripping the side, and she scampers out as quickly as possible, fixing her dress and ignoring Yixing and Baekhyun’s eyes on her, Yixing’s questioning and Baekhyun’s—she doesn’t want to figure it out.

She throws herself at Seulgi and Irene as soon as she spots them. Seulgi is out of it, cheeks red, but Irene is grinning ear-to-ear as she passes her drink to Sunhye, wordlessly.

“What?” Sunhye mumbles after not-so-graciously chugging Irene’s drink.

“You’re just cute when you’re flustered.” Irene tells her, shrugging, her tone annoyingly cryptic. The look in her eyes has Sunhye wanting to fold in on herself, somehow. Sunhye glances back at the booth she left Yixing and Baekhyun at, where they’re both drinking and talking with Johnny and Taeyong.

Sunhye turns back to Irene and she’s laughing, now, head thrown back. Sunhye’s face is on fire.

“Let’s go dance.” Irene says, tugging Sunhye’s elbow and Sunhye’s glad that Irene doesn’t ask or say anything else. She’s glad Irene is letting her live, for once. She lets out a deep breath she didn’t know she was holding all this time, focusing on just having fun.

~.~.~.~.~

Sunhye sways outside the bar, hugging Taeyong tightly while she mumbles-sings happy birthday offkey and Taeyong hiccups thanks, love you so much in response. Jaehyun snickers as he watches the two of them clinging to each other, slowly rocking from side-to-side.

Yixing grins, reaching out to rub Taeyong’s back while he says, “You’re not going to love her that much when you’re hungover tomorrow and remember how many shots she got you to take.”

"Or the bill." Jaehyun adds, snorting.

Taeyong mumbles something incoherent just as his taxi pulls up. Taeyong clings to Jaehyun, Sunhye helping to get them in the taxi, Seulgi kissing Taeyong’s cheek while Johnny gets into the passenger’s seat, hugging Sunhye, Irene, Yixing, and Seulgi before he does so. They wave off the taxi just as Baekhyun rolls up with his sportscar. She blushes a little when he comes around to their side and opens the backseat, gesturing for her to get in.

Baekhyun asks Irene and Seulgi if they want a ride—Wendy had decided to go home with someone she met at the club, Jongin disappeared with that girl he had been dancing with, the both of them texting the group chat with their locations so no one would worry, and Taeil had left a little earlier to make sure a couple of Taeyong’s other friends got home safely—but they decline. They both live together just down the street from this bar and they supposedly want fresh air. At least that's what Irene says with a -eating grin (directed at Sunhye, for some godforsaken reason) plastered across her face.

There’s another look in Irene’s eyes as she declines a second time for both Seulgi and her, waving as she turns away, half-dragging a confused Seulgi behind her. “Text me when you’re home safe!” Sunhye calls after her.

“You, too!” Irene responds, stumbling down the sidewalk, pushing Seulgi into walking forward.

Yixing slips into the backseat beside her and she tucks herself under his arm, watching as he pulls out his phone, scrolling mindlessly through Instagram. The silence that falls over them is comforting in its familiarity. Despite the world spinning ever-so-slightly and the warmth coursing through her, she is content, with Yixing’s arm wrapped around her so securely.

Overthinking, she knows, is a problem of hers. She can never stop it. So, of course, her brain reels into Bad Territory, reminding her of her guilt, yanking her out of her content so harshly, she wonders if mental whiplash is a real thing. In the darkness, under the glow of occasional streetlamps and LED storefront signs, Baekhyun glows and it is distracting. Yixing is sitting behind him and she can see his side profile, the curves of his jaw, his nose, the way he nibbles at his bottom lip, the—she blinks, startled, when Baekhyun turns his head, just a bit, and looks her dead in the eye.

She reddens, turning away instantly, focusing instead on Yixing’s mindless scrolling.

“He’s cute.” She supplies, nodding at one of the pictures, because that is all her alcohol-addled brain can manage apparently—just constant admission of attraction. She's really one of those drunks. It's embarrassing, because she never realized until tonight. She inhales, holding her breath, glancing up just to gauge Yixing’s reaction at her comment. She does this every time, even though she knows he never minds when she expresses any attraction to strangers. She used to hook up with a lot of people before Yixing and Yixing knew about all of them. Maybe, he just got used to it during that time, when they were both pining for each other and being 'generall dumb as hell' as their friends like to put it. Besides, she doesn’t mind either when he does the same. She was also on the same boat as him, in that regard, though Yixing had always been more into serious relationships rather than casual flings, unlike her.

Yixing just smiles, a small dimple forming, even as he dips his head and she watches him double-tap the picture. “He is really cute. It's why I follow him.” Yixing’s voice is louder than it has to be, much louder than her low tone. “Though, he's not as cute as me, right?”

She shakes her head, solemn, “Never.”

“And, what about Baekhyun?”

She stumbles over her response, pausing briefly, “I—uh, what about him?”

“Is he cuter than me?” Yixing hums. There is amusement lacing his tone. She glances up, notices a stiffness to Baekhyun’s shoulders.

“No.” She states, going for a joking jab at Baekhyun, though her stomach flips, not because she’s lying, because she’s not, of course she's not. She loves Yixing more than anything and she’s in awe of how attractive he is almost every day but that question—it makes her think of things she doesn’t necessarily want to think of.

“I should really make you both walk.” Baekhyun deadpans.

“You should, but you won’t.” Yixing glances up from his phone, smiling so cheekily now. He’s staring at the rearview mirror and Sunhye can’t see Baekhyun’s expression, can’t see the look they’re sharing through the rearview mirror. Yixing’s more talkative when he drinks, a little less kind and a little more mischievous. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy seeing him like this. It’s refreshing, even when he says, tone playful, “If it’s any consolation, I think you’re cuter than Sunhye.”

“Hey!” Sunhye pulls away, poking Yixing in the ribs, her head spinning.

Yixing laughs at her response, reaching out to press his palms to her cheek. She splutters out something incoherent, unable to contain her laughter—she’s way too drunk and will be way too hungover tomorrow—and Yixing leans in and presses kisses to her face. “You’re—cute—but—Baekhyun’s—cuter—It's—a—fact.” He kisses her between each word, easily pushing her down into the backseat as he does so.

She can’t help but giggle with each kiss, despite her attempts at looking serious. His words, however, trigger something strange in her chest. Yixing kisses the corner of , gentle but less chaste than before, a little too deeply especially with someone else in the car, and she chances a glance over Yixing’s shoulder, one hand bracing the leather seat under her while the other one curls into the soft fabric of Yixing’s shirt. Her gaze flickers up and Baekhyun is awash in the bright, urgent red of a stoplight. His eyes are on the rearview mirror, lingering for a moment too long, before he looks away. He must feel her gaze on him. He must, because he looks over at her, looks her dead in the eye once again while Yixing presses kiss after kiss after kiss to her lips, touch so loving, so painfully caring, but filled with a slight urgency.

His eyes are glowing. But then Baekhyun turns away, just as the car jerks forward, roughly, as if Baekhyun’s stomped on the brakes. He probably did—both metaphorically and literally—because suddenly she’s tossed towards the front seats, scrambling to keep herself upright while Yixing yelps as he tumbles into the gap between the front two seats and the backseat, groaning as he goes down.

“No ing making out in my backseat, heathens.” Baekhyun grits out. “And put your damn seatbelts on.”

Her heart feels like it will jump out of her chest. Yixing giggles at Baekhyun, despite Baekhyun's blatant death glare, as he helps her with her seatbelt before he puts his own on.

“Shut the up.” Baekhyun tells him, without nearly enough venom, clearing his throat as he shifts in his seat right after.

~.~.~.~.~

Baekhyun blinks at them, grocery bags going slack in his grip. “What the .”

Yixing blinks, owlishly, at Baekhyun. He’s currently standing in the middle of the living room with a bag of ice pressed to his bare chest as he halfheartedly practices choreography he plans on teaching in his class tonight. Sunhye is lying on the floor in front of a fan pointing in Yixing’s direction with a pack of ice sitting idly on her chest, her tax filing forms neglected next to her head.

Yixing tilts his head and a giant grin spreads across his face. Sunhye is fascinated by the expression, mostly because she doesn’t understand what about their current situation warrants such joy. Sunhye lifts the melting bag of ice and presses it to her face before dragging it back along her chest and bare stomach.

Baekhyun’s eyes are so wide, she thinks they might just pop out of his head. The tips of his eats go pink.

“Oh, I thought you’d be here later.” Yixing says, tilting his head to the side.

Baekhyun opens and closes his mouth about three times before his voice booms, echoing throughout the apartment. “Why the are you two half ?”

“The building’s air con system broke.” Sunhye laments, sticking her face closer to the fan. She glances down at her outfit—she’s in a sports bra and short-shorts. “And I am not half-.”

Yixing glances down at his attire, too, brows furrowed cutely—he’s in basketball shorts that are a bit too short, his muscular thighs practically on display. “Neither am I.”

“Neither of you are wearing shirts. And those are not pants, Sunny.”

“It’s hot.” Sunhye moans, ignoring the butterflies at the pit of her stomach at that nickname.

Baekhyun looks unaffected by the heat, which she figures may be because of his vampirism, since whenever she touches him he’s cold, but he seems surprisingly speechless as he stares at them. He just stares and stares and stares. She notices that he can’t seem to look away. She figures they must look ridiculous to him and his conservative ancient Joseon Dynasty mind. That must be it.

Baekhyun visibly gulps when she sits up and presses the dripping ice pack to her neck, retying her hair into a ponytail, his eyes following both movements, lingering.

"Wait a minute." Yixing’s grin widens before he speaks, though his tone is full of mischief. Baekhyun's eyes flicker to Yixing, skittering down before returning quickly to Yixing's face. If Sunhye weren’t so ing hot she’d question Yixing and his tone. Instead, she just watches while Yixing says, “You’re practically a walking block of ice. Come here.”

Baekhyun blinks rapidly at Yixing’s words.

“…What?” Baekhyun steps back when Yixing steps forward. Sunhye thinks it's funny that Baekhyun seems so flustered for once.

Sunhye’s face lights up as she registers Yixing's implications, “Oh, he’s right. You’re always cold! I bet cuddling you could make it feel less like Satan’s personal sauna in here.”

“For you two, maybe.” Baekhyun mumbles, crossing his arms over his chest. Then he says, louder, “I am not ing cuddling either of you sweaty idiots.”

“But we’re hot.” Sunhye bemoans, groaning loudly, parched.

Yixing’s grin looks like it’ll tear his face in half as he looks at Baekhyun, meeting his gaze. They seem to have a silent conversation of sorts—she briefly wonders when they got to that point in their friendship—and Baekhyun’s expression goes from slightly flustered to incredibly murderous. “Don’t you da—”

“Like Sunhye said, we’re hot, aren’t we, Baekhyun?” Yixing's dimple is in full view.

Sunhye blinks, confused, because suddenly her lamenting about the heat sounds too much like an innuendo and it’s coming out of Yixing’s mouth, of all people.

Baekhyun doesn’t snap out a no like she expects him to. He just sighs, staring up at the ceiling as if he’s lamenting God Himself, which she isn’t sure he can even do since she never got to the do crosses kill vampires set of stereotypical questions yet.

Baekhyun sighs, long and suffering, before he waves at both of them, spinning on his heels and throwing open the front door. “Both of you put some ing clothes on. You’re staying at my place until this is fixed.”

She sits up, "Really?"

Yixing is grinning. "Is cuddling really that bad?"

"Come on. Before I leave you two here to melt." Baekhyun states, nose scrunching up in the cutest manner as he purses his lips.

She gathers a bag, quickly, hurrying down to his car, and she briefly notices Yixing smiling so pleasantly at Baekhyun, Yixing's skin glistening from sweat, dimples on full blast, “So…you never answered my question.  Do you think we’re hot?”

“I swear to God—”

“Is that possible? I thought vampires couldn’t do that. Swearing to God, I mean.” Sunhye inserts as she slips into the air-conditioned car, groaning happily against the cool leather seats. Baekhyun blinks at her for a moment before he seems to register her words.

“Maybe I can kill you and then you can ask God yourself.” Baekhyun snaps, though his grimace turns into an annoyed pout, pink lips jutting out. His pout is so adorable Sunhye’s heart nearly jumps out of her chest.

“Oof, so touchy.” Yixing mumbles, reaching out to pat Baekhyun’s shoulder good-naturedly. Baekhyun’s pout deepens, though he doesn’t smack Yixing’s hand away like she’d expect him to. Instead, his grip on the steering wheel just tightens.

~.~.~.~.~

Despite the vitamins and Baekhyun-approved diet, she still has too many bouts of exhaustion and insomnia. Her doctor mentioned she’ll start to see results over time, but she hates the weakness that comes with it, the spinning head, the inability to sleep no matter how badly she wants to, the shortness of breath. She hated it before, and she hates it now. Why her body decided it’d skimp out on red blood cells, she isn’t sure, but it’s exhausting.

After Yixing’s dance class, he has a bartending shift, so it’s currently bordering on Way-Too-Late and she can’t sleep. She’s just staring up at the ceiling in Baekhyun’s guest room and trying not too think too much—because that certainly does not help her insomnia one bit. It also doesn’t help that lately, whenever she gets a moment alone, her brain decides to bombard her with thoughts about Baekhyun, about her guilt towards Yixing, about how absolutely ty she is.

She flails in her bed, groaning into the pillow underneath her, not above tearing her own hair out if that’ll stop her brain from thinking and thinking and whispering what ifs and showing her everything wrong she’s ever done in her life, starting with that stupid ing drunken kiss.

There’s a knock at the door. At first, she wonders if it’s just a part of her imagination, but then it comes again. It’s so tentative.

She blinks at the dark outline of the door. “Yeah?”

The door opens slowly and Baekhyun peeks in. She can’t see his expression in the darkness of her room, the light behind him shadowing it further.

“Do you want hot chocolate?”

“It’s like a hundred degrees out.”

“So what? It’s hot chocolate.”

“…You’re right. Yes, please.”

He beckons for her to follow him, leaving the door ajar. Slowly, she slips out of bed, readjusting Yixing’s giant sweatshirt she stole from him before she pads after him. She glances at the clock over the stove as she steps into the kitchen, frowning because it’s nearly two in the morning. She has an early morning class.

“I heard this helps with insomnia.” He nods at the steaming cup of hot chocolate sitting on the counter.

“Aren't you gonna have one?” She asks as she settles into his bar stool. He leans back against the counter next to the stove, reaching behind him to pluck a wine glass off the counter.

“Nope, I’m drinking this.”

She peers at the wine glass, the liquid a dark red. He swirls the cup and—her brain registers that the viscosity of the liquid is thicker than wine. That's it, though. Her exhausted brain tries to put two and two together, the viscosity and the color, and she knows she's aware of what exactly he's drinking, watching as Baekhyun takes a sip, watching her watch him, the drink staining his lips a deep rouge, but her brain doesn't supply her the answer. Maybe it's a defense mechanism or something. Maybe she's just really really tired.

She stares and stares, thinks and thinks and tries to connect the dots, forcing the gears to shift in her brain, until he murmurs, so very softly, red still staining his lips, a little color returning to his pale face, “Stop thinking so hard. It’s just wine.”

“Every single cell in my body is yelling that it’s not.” She manages to murmur, finally able to pick up the hot chocolate. She blows at the steam, the warmth of it soothing to her cool hands.

There is an unasked question lingering between them. She can’t stop looking at the wine glass, at the red liquid staining the glass.

Baekhyun sighs, gulps down a little bit more. His eyes brighten almost instantly, “I have a friend who works at the hospital.”

Her grip tightens around the mug. She manages a sip and the liquid is sweet, soothing, but it burns her tongue. She on her tongue for a moment before she whispers, “You don’t have to explain it.”

(Honestly, she's just too tired for an explanation, for yet another thing she needs to unpack.)

There’s another long pause. She speaks up after taking another sip. It’s cooler and she relishes in the calming warmth spreading through her. “Thank you, by the way, for letting us crash here. The landlord says it’ll be fixed tomorrow—or I guess tonight. He mentioned that it looks like someone physically broke it and he's checking CCTVs to figure out who it was. Either way, we're be gone soon.”

“It’s all right, you know. You’re both always welcome here.”

She glances around the open space layout of the kitchen and living room, the high ceilings, the wealth, and she remembers when she first woke up here, how out of place she felt in his apartment. She’s visited enough between then and now for that awkwardness to be something of the past. Now, whenever she types in the passcode she’s memorized and bounds into his apartment, slipping on one of the extra slippers he bought for Yixing and her, Baekhyun’s apartment feels just as much like home as hers does. It’s a testament to the inaccuracy of first impressions.

“It’s too big, anyway.” Baekhyun says, glancing around him wistfully as he takes a big gulp of his drink, pulling her away from her thoughts.

She looks up at him, her fingers curling around the mug. Baekhyun stares at his glass of wine, swirling it slowly, eyes so far away, lost in memories so distant, she thinks he’ll lose himself there. At times like this, she wonders where he goes.

She looks around again, pursing her lips, and she can’t imagine living here alone. She can’t imagine how small she’d feel surrounded by so much space.

“You’ve lived lifetimes already. Why do you—” She gestures around her. “Why are you so alone?”

She doesn’t understand it.

Baekhyun chugs down the contents of his glass before he looks up at her. She gulps down some hot chocolate, only so she has something to do under Baekhyun’s scrutinizing gaze.

“It’s just easier that way.” Baekhyun says, so simply.

He looks so uncaring, so flippant, but his words are broken things that lodge in her chest. They hurt. They are so ing sad. There’s an overwhelming pressure growing in her chest as she blinks at him, an emotion gathering there that makes it hard for her to breathe. She can't imagine being alone here, can't imagine the vulnerability, the thought of remaining with her thoughts for so long. He must be so lonely.

“I’m so sorry.” The tears filling her eyes surprises even herself. She tries to blink them way, but it doesn’t work. Surprise flashes through his features, matching her feelings, his lips turning down into an immediate frown, and her eyes and nose sting as the emotion whirling inside her intensifies, a wave of empathy yanking her emotions straight out of her. The exhaustion must be getting to her, fraying her nerves, she decides, horrified at the tears beginning to spill.

“You’re—why are you crying?” He asks, his voice rising in pitch as he pushes himself off the counter he was leaning back on.

She shakes her head, brushing away her tears in embarrassment. They won’t stop, though. Why won’t they stop? “It’s just—You don’t deserve to live like this.”

She hiccups weakly and he rounds the counter, crouching so he’s at eye level with her. He reaches out, hesitant at first, before he brushes away her tears with the pads of his fingers, his touch cool and feather-light. He touches her like she is fragile and it would bother her at any other time, but right now, it's soothing. He shushes her, his voice low, gentle, “Don’t cry.”

She squeezes her eyes shut, as if she can somehow stop the tears that way, and whimpers, “I’m so stupid for crying because it’s not li—like I’m the one—but—look at you, you pretend to be so mean, but you’re really such a sweetheart and you're so funny and witty and—" She hiccups, stuttering as she rubs away her tears, "You just really, really don’t deserve to be so alone, so lonely, and I’m so stupid, I thought immortality sounded nice, but it’s so clear that—that—that—”

Her voice breaks and her silent tears morphs into a choked sob that has Baekhyun looking more panicked then anything, though there is a smile tugging at his lips.

“Stop smiling, it’s not funny.” Sunhye blubbers, through her tears. She lightly smacks Baekhyun’s chest and he tries and fails to hide his snicker, even as she smacks him again. “It’s just n—not fair.” She hiccups, unable to stop rambling. “St—stop laughing at me!”

“I’m not laughing at you.” Baekhyun drops his smile, expression turning serious, sincere, his cool hands cupping her cheeks as he brushes away all her tears very carefully, with a tenderness that makes her blush. “You’re just…” His smile widens, the hard lines of his face melting away completely, “So sweet. You’re crying for me. Because you don't like that I might be alone. Why are you humans so ing cute?”

He murmurs the last question, even as he wraps his arms around Sunhye, hugging her tight, her hair. She buries her face in his chest, breathing in the scent of cotton detergent as she wills her exhausted brain to stop being so embarrassing. She quiets down after a few minutes, while Baekhyun brushes a hand up and down her spine, the touch so comforting, so soothing, that it has her relaxing, slumping in his arms. There’s a pressure at the top of her head before Baekhyun pulls back, tucking stray pieces of hair behind her ears with tender care. Her eyes droop a bit—the crying fit coupled with the warm hot chocolate must have exhausted her body thoroughly enough for her to actually feel the need to sleep, for once.

“I choose to live this way, so don’t worry so much over me, okay?” His finger stills against the skin of her jaw and her eyes refuse to stay open as he massages letters she will never know along the skin there.

“I can’t help it.” She mumbles, reaching up to rub her eyes. “At least…at least promise me you you’ll…you’ll call us or something? When you feel lonely? Or sad?”

She can’t imagine how lonely he must feel, living in such vast apartments, not just for one lifetime, but hundreds of them. She can imagine, to an extent, what it must feel like—loneliness—because she is no stranger to it, but she's lucky enough to not have to deal with being alone. She has Yixing. She has her friends. She has her parents' phone calls. But to be both alone and lonely, for decades, maybe even centuries? The half of her heart that does not belong to Yixing feels like it’s tearing into a million pieces, all latching onto Baekhyun.

Her voice breaks a bit, despite how hard she tries to maintain at least some of her dignity—because she is just a mere human crying for a man, a vampire, who does not seem at all upset about his life and his predicament, who is perhaps used to it, who she is only burdening with her tears and her emotions—as she attempts to stare him down and at least make him listen to her one request. Baekhyun just grins at her adamant expression, a small noise of amusement leaving his mouth.

“Promise me you’ll call.” She insists, reaching out to grab his cool hand, squeezing his fingers between hers. Baekhyun stares at their hands for a moment, his honey eyes glowing, reminding her of the Earth after a spring rain.

“I promise.” He nods, his voice thick with an emotion she can’t pinpoint. His gaze lifts from their intertwined hands to her eyes, sincere. “I promise.”

She nods, satisfied, and shuts her eyes, yawning after a moment. Baekhyun wordlessly helps her off the stool, still holding her hands. Then he untangles his fingers from hers, a small smile playing on his lips as he does so, lifting one finger at a time. She watches him do it, blinking sleepily, and she ignores the strange emptiness that follows the loss of contact. Slowly, she stumbles back, away from him, stifling another yawn. He watches her go. She can feel his eyes on her back as she turns.

She pauses at the threshold, glancing back at Baekhyun over her shoulder, “Thank you for the hot chocolate, Baek.”

He nods, waving a pretty hand dismissively, and she makes her way back to her guest room. She hears the front door open, hears Baekhyun murmuring to someone, but she knocks out moments after her head hits the pillow.

~.~.~.~.~

“How did you two get together?”

Sunhye swallows a spoonful of yogurt—the healthy expensive organic kind that Baekhyun had bought for her, ignoring her protests because occasionally she feels bad about how much money Baekhyun spends on her, despite Yixing telling her sometimes capitalism is okay, especially when you’re not the one participating in it (a response that makes her frown at Yixing and earns her a cheeky little grin) and Baekhyun rolling his eyes and telling her for the last time, I don’t care, I have no one to spend the money on, anyway (a response that always makes her redden inexplicably because of the sincere look in his eyes as he says it).

Sunhye on her spoon and Baekhyun’s eyes flicker down her face before they return to her eyes. She pretends like she doesn’t notice but her cheeks still heat up.

She points the spoon at him, “I’m sure you and Yixing have talked about it when you go grocery shopping.”

“Yes.” Baekhyun dips his head, “But I want to hear your side of the story.”

“Living vicariously through us, are you?”

Baekhyun makes a face, “You know what, never mind.”

“It’s not a very fun story.” Sunhye ignores Baekhyun’s scowl as she scoops up more yogurt and stares at her spoon for a moment, contemplating how to continue. “We’ve known each other for ages. I liked him. He liked me. But neither of us thought it was mutual, so we dated other people to get our minds off it until eventually the emotions built up way too high and we both just burst. It didn’t help that we lived together either throughout the peak part of all this. Irene was, like, five seconds away from strangling us because of the pining, the crying. God, I can’t believe I was like that.”

“I can believe it. You’re very ing emotional.” Baekhyun says, matter-of-factly, grinning suddenly.

She throws a balled-up napkin at him. He easily plucks it out of the air with such casual grace, nearly drops open. Nearly, though, since she’s not trying to add to his already giant, centuries old ego.

“You cried last week when they played that one song on the radio. ‘Crazy, Cool’ or whatever it’s called.” Baekhyun continues, bluntly. “Just because they kept ing singing it’s so easy to love you.”

“It’s cute, okay? It’s just such a nice thing to hear!” Sunhye flails in her seat, one hand on her cheek so she can somehow stop the embarrassment from setting her whole face on fire.

Baekhyun laughs, throws back his head and lets out this laugh that encompasses his whole body. “You can get so ing flustered sometimes.” Baekhyun mumbles, after a long moment. Sunhye scowls at him through her hands, patting her hot cheeks as she wills them to go back to normal. “I’d pay good money just to see that moment when you and Yixing finally snapped.”

“It wasn’t that bad.”

“Really?” Baekhyun raises a brow, “Yixing told me he dressed up in a suit and brought flowers, except they were white lilies and you asked him ‘Who died?’ And then, when he told you that no one, in fact, ing died, and he was confessing, you started ing stuttering and then locked yourself in your room for a good five minutes only to come out wearing—”

“I remember what happened!” This time Sunhye throws her spoon at him.

Baekhyun catches it out of the air as easily as he did the napkin, casually leaning forward to place it back in her unfinished yogurt cup, watching as she sinks lower and lower in her chair, face buried in her hands.

“You’re so cute.” He laughs, again, louder this time.

“And you’re a demon.” She mumbles.

There’s another pause, a long one, before she peeks at him through the opening between her fingers and she watches the way he leans forward against the table, elbow propped up and chin resting on his palm, head tilted as he appraises her flustered, sinking form.

“You love him a lot, don’t you?”

“More than anything. So much that sometimes it’s just,” She pauses, dropping her hands to her lap, her eyes lingering on Baekhyun’s expression, “It’s overwhelming.”

Baekhyun nods, so very slowly, and there is a look in his eyes she can’t quite place, “Good.” He says.

She stares at him. “Jongdae asked me the same thing. When I first started dating Yixing.”

“Jongdae? Yixing’s old roommate?” Baekhyun asks. She surprised, for a moment, that Baekhyun knows that much about Yixing. She didn’t realize they were so close, especially since there’s always a strange tension lingering between them that she attributed to weird manly competitiveness. She knew they were friends, that they talked and hung out a lot, but she didn't realize to what extent, until maybe now. Maybe it was obvious earlier and she's just self-absorbed. Maybe the strange tension never had anything to do with manly competitiveness and she's just applying societal expectations on them.

She nods, shaking away her errant train of thought. “Yeah, it was a part of his whole ‘you-hurt-him-and-I’ll-hurt-you’ speech.”

“Did you get those a lot?”

She nods, “Even from Yixing’s dance classes. Like, even the younger classes said something, which was so wild? I never said more than two words to Bin or Rocky since Yixing introduced us, but suddenly they showed up flanked by a bunch of dance kids—literal babies—and threatened to bury me alive in an undisclosed location if I ever broke Yixing’s heart. They were, like, literally twelve years old, Baek.”

There’s a pause as Sunhye scowls at the memory and the slight fear she felt at being cornered by so many people who loved Yixing that much. She doesn’t notice Baekhyun lean closer. She glances at him, at his hair falling into his eyes and his twinkling brown eyes, “Yixing told me you had a reputation.”

She raises her brow because he did? What the hell don’t Yixing and Baekhyun talk about, then?

Still, she shrugs, trying to look unaffected. “I liked having no-strings attached hook-ups but people caught feelings even though we agreed on rules. Is there something wrong with that?” She makes a face before her shoulders fall a bit. She hides her admission around a spoonful of yogurt. “Besides, I did it to…uh, cope with all my feelings, I guess.”

“There’s nothing wrong with hooking up just to hook up.” Baekhyun rolls his eyes, good-naturedly, still leaning too close, one of his pretty hands dancing across the table, the corners of his lips twitching upwards. “You two just sound like some ty teen romance movie, except you’re the bad one and Yixing’s the sweetheart innocent one with overprotective friends.”

She never thought of it that way and it makes her laugh because he's right. With the amount of casual hookups and flirting she did compared to Yixing, everyone might as well call her John Bender. Yixing is certainly sweet enough to be the Molly Ringwald-type character. Then she shrugs and says, “It didn’t bother me though—aside from the dance kids because that'd bother anyone. It just shows that he has a lot of people who love him.”

Baekhyun tilts his head to the side, peering at her as if he’s looking straight into her soul and plucking out everything, laying out all her deepest thoughts side-by-side to examine thoroughly. “You do, too.”

There’s something so very pointed about the way he says that. She overthinks things. She always has. And she remembers lonely nights lying awake, unable to sleep, when she’d try to tell herself not to internalize all those jokes—because that’s what they are, just jokes—about how Yixing is her better half, how sometimes she really did genuinely believe that Yixing was too good to be true, too good for her. She knows she’d sometimes idealize him, knows that’s not something she should be doing, ever, to anyone, but overthinking will be the bane of her existence and she’s sure her brain wishes to drown her in stupid thoughts about how much better Yixing is than her, how much she doesn’t deserve him, how she shouldn’t be so selfish and should just let him go, set him free and all that bull. It’s stupid. She knows it’s stupid. But, also, a small part of her brain doesn’t think it’s stupid. A small part of her thinks it’s real and it leaves her a crying, anxious, insecure mess, no matter how hard she tries to pretend she is not. Baekhyun stares at her. She has to fight the sting at the back of her eyes and the overwhelming need to sob at the way he’s looking at her, the way he seems to know exactly what she thinks about late at night, when she’s alone.

She blinks, rapidly, whispers, “Of course I do.”

But her voice sounds shaky, uncertain, even to her own ears.

Baekhyun pretends like it doesn’t. He just picks up her bowl of yogurt, replies, "You do."

Then, he disappears into the kitchen, allowing her to compose herself.

~.~.~.~.~

Sunhye’s trying to relax, her feet sore and back hurting, from her long day of classes followed by a long shift waitressing. Her tip out was decent for a Tuesday, but someone had called out and she had to pick up another section since they were short on staff. She’s exhausted and she’d rather just sleep, but she still needs to finish up a couple assignments.  Still, she doesn’t want to move and Yixing gently massaging her ankles and calves in his lap doesn’t help her much in terms of motivation to get up.

And, as if on cue, there’s a series of beeps and the door to her apartment is pushed open, revealing a ruffled Baekhyun. He’s gnawing on his bottom lip, a nervous expression she’s never seen on him before, as he wordlessly strides into their apartment and plops down on the old butterfly chair beside the couch. She strains her neck from where she’s resting her head against the couch’s arm, frowning as she throws Yixing a questioning look. Yixing just shrugs at her, concern filling his kind eyes.

“Of course you can come in.” Sunhye says, eventually, when the silence draws on and Baekhyun is still staring so intently at his phone, as if it will explode at any moment. “Why are you looking at your phone like that?”

“Like what?” Baekhyun asks, without looking up from his phone.

“Like it’s going to explode.” Yixing supplies helpfully when she just drops her head back on the couch and decides she doesn’t have the energy to listen to Baekhyun answer her questions with questions. He does that often, she notices, especially when something is bothering him.

Baekhyun scoffs, but he doesn’t say anything.

Yixing shrugs and returns to massaging her legs. She closes her eyes.

“I really need to finish my homework.” She mumbles, sleepily.

“It can wait.” Yixing reassures her. "Give yourself five more minutes, okay?"

She nods, smiling despite her exhaustion, eyes still closed.

It’s quiet again, silence content, and she opens her eyes just because she’s afraid she’ll fall asleep otherwise.

(And, also, because she can feel Baekhyun’s eyes on her. She turns her head, the angle hurting her neck, just to meet his unrelenting gaze head-on, and she does, for just a moment, before his brows furrow and he turns back to his phone, bottom lip caught in his teeth.)

There’s another stretch of silence before curiosity finally gets the best of her. She flops over onto her stomach, refusing to get up as she stretches out across the floor to the ratty butterfly chair he’s sitting on—the one she’s had since high school. The image of him sitting in it is amusing because it sinks so low that his knees are practically pressed to his chest. It practically engulfs him with how stretched out it is and it makes him look less ethereal than usual, less vampiric, more human, kinda dorky. She reaches out, torso hovering haphazardly between the couch and the chair, and she taps his knee. He looks down at her, eyes widening just a fraction of an inch in surprise. As a vampire, he shouldn't be so surprised. He must be really troubled not to notice her approaching.

She rolls back onto the couch, the sound of her struggling from rolling around since she refuses to actually get up echoing all around them. Yixing continues tapping out gentle rhythms against the top of her shins, seemingly unfazed. Baekhyun just judges her and she ignores him.

A moment of silence passes after she’s settles back into the couch, when Baekhyun says, “It would have been so much easier if you just got up or called my name.”

“Too much work.” She mumbles, waving a hand. She looks up at him, wondering if she should just say it.

“Weirdo.” He says, with a hint of affection that nearly buries the obvious concern he’s had since he stomped through her front door. Whatever is on that phone is really bothering him.

His pretty eyes, redder now then ever she notices, purplish bruises spotting the skin under his eyes, narrow into slits, thickening the tension in the room so suddenly, she nearly loses her breath. Despite her exhaustion, a shiver runs down her back. A small part of her knows, is so highly aware, that the shiver is not necessarily from fear and it takes too much mental strength for the bigger part of her to silently chastise her. Still, she reminds herself to shut up because thoughts like that is Dangerous Territory.

“What do you want?” Baekhyun asks, eventually, seemingly giving up on waiting for her to ask. She thinks she should be the one asking her that question since he’s the one who barged into her apartment unannounced.

She pauses, wonders if she should say it, and then she sees the look on Baekhyun’s face, a look that causes another stupid shiver to run right down the center of her spine and to the tips of her toes. She blurts out, in an attempt to distract herself, “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He snaps, though there is no bite whatsoever behind his words. It sounds more like an admission of sorts. An exhausted resignation. It makes her a little sad.

Still, she doesn’t push it. She just nods. The hand tapping out a rhythm against her shins stills.

“Whatever it is,” Yixing is the one to speak, then, his voice low, gentle as the sound of spring rain. She blinks at Yixing, startled by his sudden insertion, the firmness lingering there in his voice. His tone isn’t so exhausted; instead, it’s a promise, it’s how he speaks to her when she’s overwrought with thoughts and he whispers that everything will be okay with such certainty, she genuinely begins to believe it. “You can talk to us about it whenever you’re ready, okay? We’re both here to listen.”

The silence that stretches on after is deafening. She tilts her head back to look at Baekhyun and his brows are still furrowed together, his lips still pursed. Her heart skips a beat when his eyes drop away from Yixing, when he looks at her. His eyes drift, lingering on her eyes, before they inch upwards just a bit, slowly so slowly down the length of her, to where Yixing is sitting with her legs across his lap, and her toes curl at the way he bites his lip, for just a brief moment. Then his gaze returns to hers and she tenses at the light in his red eyes. For a moment, everything slows down and she is hyperaware of what she must look like to him, sprawled out on the couch this way, her neck bared to him because of the way she’s stretching to look at him. She briefly revels in that self-aware space, wonders what it must mean. What does it mean? Why is she so attracted to him even though she knows she shouldn't be? Why is she noticing all this? And then she quickly decides it’s because she’s exhausted, too exhausted to right her thoughts. Yixing’s fingers brush her knees and she jolts out of her thoughts. She tears her eyes off Baekhyun’s, dropping her head down, curling in on herself a bit more, compressing her sprawled out form, and focuses instead on Yixing.

Yixing smiles, so pleasantly, dimples appearing, his eyes lingering on her and then over her shoulder, his tongue darting out to wet his lips, before returning to her. He's still smiling. Clearly, he hadn’t noticed anything. She feels horrible. She feels terrible.

“Okay, I will.” Baekhyun’s voice comes out low, hits her nerves in the strangest way, especially because of how exhausted she already is. It’s almost nice. Warm and cozy, secure, blanketing her with the strangest fuzzy feelings.

She groans inwardly at the errant thoughts, almost groans out loud, really.

“It’s the least we can do, right?” Sunhye says, trying to distract herself, though she can’t get herself to look at Baekhyun, staring at anything and everything but him.

“Sure.” Baekhyun responds, tone still so low, so raspy, almost a growl.

Yixing laughs. She isn’t quite sure why he laughs, his fingertips pressing into the skin of her calves. There’s nothing funny about any of this. She’s just feeling overwhelmed.

~.~.~.~.~

To: Baek 

SOS.

Sunhye crosses her arms, watching as Baekhyun pulls up in front of the university in his black car, windows down, hair pushed back and up, in artful disarray, expensive sunglasses perched on his nose. He turns heads, even from inside a damn car, everyone staring at her as she cautiously heads to his car, keeping her head down. She notices frowns—Yixing is very much loved by a lot of people and she has a reputation, even though it's been a couple years, so it must be an untrustworthy sight, seeing her get into a hot stranger’s car without Yixing anywhere in sight. She has attractive friends, but none of them drive fancy cars or look so decadent, so much like a heartbreaker, the way Baekhyun does. Even though it’s none of their business, she still ruminates a bit on what they must be thinking.

Baekhyun pulls her out of her thoughts when he looks over at her, pulling his sunglasses off to narrow his eyes, accusingly giving her unscathed body several once-overs before he intones, “You don’t look like you’re having an emergency.”

“Yixing’s being weird.” She says, without thinking, mostly because she just feels frustrated and confused, more than anything.

Baekhyun sighs, outright rolling his eyes, “So?”

“I’ve figured out why.”

For a moment, Baekhyun looks surprised and almost concerned, worried. But then the expression disappears and is replaced by disbelief and raised eyebrows. He says, with a lot of confidence, “You haven’t figured out .”

She shakes her head, face lighting up as she bounces in her seat and exclaims, “I’ve figured it out!”

Baekhyun’s sigh is audible.

She says, ignoring his pessimism with a shake of her head, “I'm pretty sure I just need to spice things up. Maybe buy him a nice gift.”

“So, why the did you text me?”

She blinks at him, “I just paid some bills, so I’m kind of broke.”

Baekhyun sighs even louder, but he doesn’t stomp on the brakes and kick her out or anything. She smiles, reaching out to squeeze his forearm.

“Thanks.” She tells him.

“You’re lucky I like you.” Baekhyun mumbles, glancing down at her hand before turns back to the road.

~.~.~.~.~

“I think we’re too domestic and Yixing is, maybe, just bored of me or something.” Sunhye makes sure to keep her tone light and as nonchalant as ever, as if she isn’t admitting yet another insecurity to Baekhyun and is, instead, discussing something with less baggage, something that makes sense to talk about over ice cream.

Baekhyun stares at her in disbelief for a long, long time, his eyes digging holes into her head, until she has to look away, squirming slightly. He grumbles, “You really are an idiot if you genuinely believe he’s bored of you.”

“Well, what else would it be?” She blinks, frowning at her ice cream, “I mean, I can be pretty boring and exhausting to deal with and we’ve lived with each other for so long and—”

“Why does it have to be your fault, Sunhye? Maybe he’s just busy or ing stressed out about classes or capitalism or something. I mean, you two are broke as .”

She blinks rapidly. That sounds almost…logical. But her brain won’t accept such a simple answer—especially not one that’ll make her realize she’s just feeling insecure because her brain is ridiculous and she recognizes that, yet at the same time, she doesn’t want to acknowledge it, not out loud. She opens to argue.

Baekhyun cuts her off before she can start, eyes stern, “You really need to start getting out of that goddamn head of yours. Stop overthinking things.”

“That’s easier said than done.” She pouts.

“I can always spray you with water every time you do it. Just condition it out of you.”

She glares because Baekhyun genuinely looks like he’s contemplating what he just suggested, “Don’t you dare.” Then she sighs after a moment, returning to the topic at hand, “Okay, fine, let’s say he’s stressed. Then, how do I help him?”

“Do I look like a relationship counselor to you?”

“Please, Baek.” She unleashes her best pleading look on him. Baekhyun’s ears redden slightly, matching the shade of his eyes, and he glances away, frown deepening, before he meets her gaze again.

“…Fine.” He leans forward on the table, elbows propped up and chin resting on his palm as he eyes her. He thinks for exactly thirty whole seconds before he speaks, simply. “ the soul out of him.”

She blinks. Frowns. “Uh.” Heat creeps up her neck at the way Baekhyun has his gaze fixed on her, appraising her in silence, a tiny smirk playing at the corners of his pink lips. “Did you mean to make a vampire joke or…?”

The intensity in Baekhyun’s gaze drops as he throws back his head and groans, palms hitting the table with a soft thud. “You’re so annoying.” He grumbles. He crosses his arms over his chest, leaning back in the chair. He sighs as he says, “I meant, him off. Dress up for him. Literally the soul out of his , .”

The way Baekhyun says that, all matter-of-fact and uncaring, as if he’s reading out of a textbook, shouldn’t appeal to her in any way, but she finds she reddens substantially at his words, choking around her spoonful of ice cream. Baekhyun just watches her choke, her eyes watering as he casually slides a couple napkins towards her. She hacks out another cough, spluttering incoherently.

Baekhyun deadpans, nodding in approval, “Do it just like that, but with more swallowing and less spitting.”

She throws her ice cream spoon at Baekhyun’s face. And then she throws five balled up napkins.

Baekhyun cackles with laughter, falling back against his chair, the other patrons of the shop glancing their way.

Her face is on fire.

~.~.~.~.~

Yixing stares at her, the wonder lighting up his eyes taking her breath away, his back against the headboard and his eyes roaming over her form. Despite the years they’ve had together, she still feels a thrill run down her spine whenever he looks at her this way, at the way his gaze drinks the sight of her in, the way his bottom lip is caught in his teeth, his pupils blown out, peering up at her in anticipation.

“What's all this for?” Yixing breathes out, his hair messy, his lips swollen, smudged with her lipstick, his gaze making her feel all warm and fuzzy.

“I just wanted to do something for you.” She mumbles as she kneels on the bed, pushing her hair out of her face. He watches her movements, unblinking, mesmerized almost. Her heart slams against her ribs.

Yixing reaches out for her, catching her waist and pulling her in. She grins into another kiss. Yixing sighs against her skin, “God, I love you so much.”

Her heart leaps in her chest at his words, like it always does, and she feels so ing elated.

(She’s going to send Baekhyun a nice thank-you gift for his advice, she decides, before she kisses Yixing's jaw, fingers trailing down his chest, along his tummy, as she murmurs, “I love you, too.”

Especially when Yixing’s head drops back against the headboard with a dull thud, making her giggle at the small hiss of pain he lets out, though he mostly ignores the pain in lieu of watching each and every one of her movements.

Baekhyun definitely deserves a fruit basket or something.)

~.~.~.~.~

They go to the beach and she invites Baekhyun, though she avoids telling him it’s for thanking him for dealing with her during one of her more embarrassingly insecure moments. She also avoids telling him she took his advice. Yixing doesn’t even bat an eye when she suggests they invite Baekhyun, smiling that cute, dimpled smile as he nods in agreement. Honestly, she thinks they all could use a vacation and the beach is free so there isn't much to lose in this situation. Besides, not being home for the day means they won’t be using much electricity and that never hurts—especially since she knows Yixing’s been cutting back on his hot showers lately because of the bills.

They pile into Baekhyun’s car and she sprawls out on the backseat, fiddling with her phone as she searches for music to play through his Bluetooth system. She doesn’t even have to ask Baekhyun to connect her phone to the Bluetooth, Baekhyun reconnecting her phone as soon as he buckles his seatbelt.

Yixing readjusts the passenger’s side seat when she leans forward and taps the back of Baekhyun’s seat.

“Yeah?” He asks, fixing the rearview mirror, his pretty brown eyes reflecting back at her.

She leans her back against the door, legs spread out across the seat (Baekhyun frowns at the sight of her feet on his leather seats but doesn’t say anything) and she says, “You sure you’re not going to turn to ash or burst into flames, though?”

Baekhyun’s eyes fill with enough fire to turn her to ash when he replies, “I will literally make you walk, Sunny.”

“I mean,” Yixing glances at Baekhyun, reaching out to tap Baekhyun’s thigh with the back of his knuckles, “It’d be a total mood kill if you did burst into flames, you know.”

“I will make both of you walk.”

Sunhye pouts, “I was just asking. Just in case.”

Yixing frowns at Sunhye’s pout before he reaches out to smack Baekhyun’s thigh harder, not-so-subtly nodding back at her. Baekhyun just smacks Yixing’s thigh back, just as hard, earning a pout from Yixing, as well. After a long moment and Yixing not once averting his eyes from Baekhyun’s face, Baekhyun seems to give in, sighing before he mumbles, “No, I will not burst into flames. You two happy now?”

“Very.” Sunhye nods, with fake solemnity.

Baekhyun rolls his eyes but she doesn’t miss his small smile. Yixing winks at her. She giggles, leaning between the front seats to fist bump Yixing right in front of Baekhyun. Baekhyun drives a pretty hand through their fist bump, breaking them apart with a scowl that doesn’t reach his eyes at all.

For once, she notices his eyes don’t look so sad or distant, like they usually do. They are pretty and almost happy and she can’t help but glance at the rearview mirror just to catch glimpses of his eyes as he drives.

~.~.~.~.~

Baekhyun rubs a blob of very strong sunscreen on his arm. Sunhye refrains from making a vampire joke, only because she’s content with just lying on the towel and bask in the warmth all around her, as well as the warm fuzzy feeling that’s been filling her up to the brim since they parked at the beach.

Yixing, though, eyes Baekhyun’s actions skeptically.

Baekhyun raises a brow.

“Weak.” Yixing states, tone pointed.

“You think you’re tougher than the sun?” Baekhyun’s brows rise further until it practically touches his hairline, “The ing sun?”

Yixing and Baekhyun lock eyes and practically stare each other down. Sunhye glances between the two from where she’s sprawled out like a starfish on her stomach under the umbrella Baekhyun remembered to bring. They just keep staring at each other, expressions unreadable. For a moment, she’s afraid they’ll start fist-fighting or something.

A tension fills the warmth surrounding her, turning that fuzziness into something a little bit stranger, maybe even sinister, something that makes her feel both confused and like she’s standing on the outside of a glass building and forced to look in, observe and react, but remain othered, an outsider of sorts. It’s a strange feeling, her stomach churning a bit.

Then, suddenly, Baekhyun pats the empty space on the blanket in front of him and the tension just spills, evaporating as if she just imagined it.

Yixing grins, dimples showing, eyes glinting the way it does when he teases her, before he plops down in front of Baekhyun, Baekhyun’s crossed knees touch Yixing’s back. Baekhyun rubs sunscreen on Yixing’s back, scowling the entire time though he is thorough, diligently rubbing in sunscreen so he doesn’t miss a spot. Sunhye watches the exchange in awe and wishes, just a bit, that she hadn’t already put on sunscreen just to be a part of this. It feels strange, to look at something and want to be a part of it. She feels out of place, especially because it’s her boyfriend and her weird vampire nutritionist friend-slash-crush who pays for her doctor’s visits. For a moment, a wild thought that maybe she’s third-wheeling Baekhyun and Yixing flits through her mind. A curling monster rears its head at the pit of her stomach at that thought and she doesn’t like the feeling that brings her. The fuzziness is momentarily replaced by a queasy feeling. She hates it because she knows it’s ridiculous.

(She mostly hates feeling left out, which just makes her feel like a child, more than anything. It's annoying.)

She turns away, resting her cheek on her forearms as she closes her eyes and tries to will those ugly thoughts and feelings away because it feels—horribly so—like jealousy and she refuses to be that girl. She’s always prided herself in being secure in her relationship with Yixing. She may not be secure in how she feels about herself, or how much Yixing loves her sometimes, but she knows that she never has a reason to be jealous and she’s always been adamantly against flipping out over stupid things like flirting. Yixing certainly never expresses any type of discomfort when she talks to anyone or hangs around with any of her exe. They’re supposed to respect and trust each other, yet, here she is.

She feels pressure on the back of her head. She opens on eye, blinking up, eyes bleary as she shoves her horrible thoughts far, far away, willing the warm happiness to return to her. It’s still there, dimmer than before. Yixing smiles down at her, gentle and soft as always, as he adjusts his snapback on her head. She smiles and he leans down, practically bending in half, just to kiss her hairline before he bounds off towards the ocean.

Baekhyun sits beside her. She rests her cheek on her forearms, momentarily appreciating a shirtless Baekhyun—he’s a little pale, probably because he’s a vampire and apparently super enthusiastic about sunscreen application—but he looks strong, the curves of his muscles prominent despite the fact that he’s slumped next to her like that, his bare thighs thick, his head tilted to the side slightly, his jawline prominent.

Baekhyun is still staring after Yixing when he says, “Are you enjoying the view?” She blinks up at him, startled, and he turns to look down at her, his jawline and playful smirk now in full view from her angle lying flat on her stomach. She swears his eyes flicker along her back before he turns back to the ocean, where Yixing is crouched on the beach, cell phone in hand. She figures he’s take pictures or something. “Because I certainly am. Though I have no ing idea where I’m supposed to look.”

There is an underlying suggestive current to his words and coupled with the way his honey brown eyes linger on her face, she knows it isn’t imagined. Still, she readjusts Yixing’s snapback on her head, lifting her head to squint at him, before she says, “No, I’m just disappointed that you’re not sparkling.”

There’s a pause. Sunhye smiles. Baekhyun’s eyes darken slightly—she hasn’t made a Twilight joke on purpose just to lull him into a false sense of security, so she can really hit him where it hurts by surprise, and she can see that processing on his face in about point three seconds—before he reaches out and pulls Yixing’s snapback down her face, making her burst into laughter.

“You’re really the ing worst.” He mumbles. His tone is filled with amusement he is obviously trying to suppress.

“You’re supposed to blind the whole beach.” She says as she pulls the snapback off and shoves his thigh—though he doesn’t even move an inch when she shoves at him, unfortunately.

“I don’t ing need crystal Twilight skin to do that.” Baekhyun states, snorting at her attempt to push him. “All—”

She interrupts him, abruptly sitting up, eyes narrowed, “Don’t you dare say—"

“All I have to do is smile.” Baekhyun beams, for good measure.

“I want a refund.” Sunhye groans, loudly. “Can I get a werewolf instead? Where’s Jacob Black when you need him?”

She shrieks dramatically when Baekhyun uses his thumb to lightly push her forehead back. Despite her obviously exaggerating her shrieking, Baekhyun still reaches out and gently rubs her forehead with soothing circles—an obvious response to the weird looks some of the other beachgoers are giving them.

“Werewolves smell like wet dog.” Baekhyun says, very seriously, as he continues rubbing her forehead. She allows herself to scoot closer and lean against him. He doesn’t shove her away.

They sit in silence as she ruminates over his sentence, realizes, yet again, that Baekhyun is a real life vampire and werewolves probably do exist and he probably knows a few. Despite the warmth returning to the pit of her stomach, spreading through her slowly, reality still trickles through and it makes her pause for much too long.

She blinks, watching as Yixing jogs back to them, hair wet and grains of sand and water droplets dotting his skin and chest in a way that makes her want to kiss every single droplet of salt water off him—even if that means she'll suffer from dehydration afterwards. She leans away from Baekhyun, glancing at him, and Baekhyun's eyes are wide, the tips of his ears red, his gaze fixed on Yixing. Something about the look on his face strikes a chord with her.

“What are you guys talking about?” Yixing asks, curious as he crouches in front of them. She blinks at his bare chest, his flexed biceps, sighing in content because wow this is really the love of her life.

“The view.” Baekhyun says and his gaze flickers from Yixing’s face, down to his chest, to his bent thighs, before they flicker back up. And then he smiles, a disarming smile that is—Sunhye can only describe it as hot. Yixing tilts his head to the side, his eyes twinkling as he drags his gaze from Baekhyun’s smiling face to Sunhye and then back.

“The view, huh? Is it nice?” Yixing asks Baekhyun, head still tilted.

“Very nice.” Baekhyun’s grin turns into a smirk, dripping from the corners of his lips like the droplets of water dotting Yixing’s skin.

Yixing laughs, short and breathy, before he reaches around Sunhye, putting his phone away, and meets Sunhye’s gaze, “Let’s go in.”

She nods, a little dumbfounded by the interaction between Yixing and Baekhyun, unable to ruminate when she's pulled up to her feet.

Yixing wraps both arms around her bare waist, kissing the corner of her lips, before he steps back and pats her , gesturing her to go ahead. Sunhye notices the strange looks she gets from some of the other beachgoers, specifically the ones who had noticed her with Baekhyun and now with Yixing. Maybe, the disgust on one of their faces is just a figment of her imagination, an insecurity she brought to life. Maybe, it’s not. She doesn’t have time to think on it when Yixing catches her around the waist and matches her stride, tapping out a rhythm she’ll never be privy to on her waist as they walk closer to the waterfront, Baekhyun walking on her other side. She notices when the cool skin of his arm brushes against hers one too many times.

She really wishes she wouldn’t notice, but she does.

~.~.~.~.~

“So, what is the real reason?”

Baekhyun leans back against his pristine couch in his too-big apartment with too-high ceilings and she keeps thinking about how lonely he must be in this vast space that engulfs him. She hasn’t stopped thinking about it since he mentioned it, since she literally sobbed imagining his loneliness. A part of her wants to occupy the space with him, Yixing alongside her, and keep him company, even when he says he’s fine. Another part of her still doesn’t want to impose, even though he had said, time and time again, that she is always welcome in his apartment. She thinks it’s a strange feeling, the flip-flop of emotions, of second guessing herself around him. He drops his head back on the couch, pale neck bared, and blinks up at the ceiling for a long moment, his eyes closing. “For what?” His voice is gruff.

Sunhye plops down on his left, watching as his brows furrow together, his eyes twitching when she accidentally jostles him as she noisily settles in beside him. She crosses her legs under her and leans in, raising a brow despite him not looking at her. “I know you keep saying that my blood smells gross and you can’t stand to let me walk around like this, but I’ve been thinking and—anemia is common, so, uh, what’s the real reason for all this?”

This time, Baekhyun expresses his irritation, face scrunching up in annoyance. “You just smell especially bad.” He states.

She pouts. He seems to sense it because he cracks an eye open, turning his head to the side, the back of his head still against the couch. For a moment, she thinks he’ll tell her he was kidding, appease her or something, because he glances down at her pout and the irritation flickers out of his eyes. For just a moment, though, before she shakes the thought from her head.

Especially when he rolls his eyes, shuffling as he settles into a more comfortable position, eyes closed, his thigh touching hers for a moment.

Sunhye huffs, flopping onto the couch and facing away from him, removing the contact because she’s starting to notice it much too often and she hates that. “Is that really it? Or…” She frowns at him, only half joking when she continues, “You’re not planning on eating me, are you? Is that why you’re making me smell good? For a future meal.”

She doesn’t expect the snort, the low snicker. She glances sideways at him from the corner of her eyes. Baekhyun still has his eyes closed but the annoyance has melted away, replaced by fond amusement. She thinks all his sharp angles are so much less cutting when he is like this. She finds she is a bit mesmerized by his smile—a genuine smile rather than a smirk. It softens all his features and the sound of his laugh is nearly contagious. Infuriatingly enough, though, he doesn’t say anything. She needs a distraction from his face.

So, she flails at his lack of response, curiosity and the need to distract herself burning inside of her. “Do you do this with all your meals?” She mumbles, arms crossed. She’s slid halfway off the leather couch in her flailing, her legs under the coffee table, her shoulder touching his thigh now.

She cranes her neck just to see Baekhyun’s face above her. Baekhyun blinks down at her, gaze unwavering, observant, and she notices a look in his eyes—a look she cannot decipher at all, though the intensity of it is skin-prickling. She swears that, maybe just maybe, there is a hint of affection living there, lighting up his brown-red eyes. She blinks in response, her breath caught in .

He breaks into a beautiful grin, all boxy, eyes sparkling with the kind of mischief he often directs at Yixing when they have play Mario Kart or discuss their favorite albums in length. He mutters, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

She slides off the couch, curling up in annoyance. Baekhyun laughs loudly at her antics, lying back on the couch with his eyes closed, ignoring her grumbling. She has half a mind to smack his leg. But when she stands up and blinks down at Baekhyun, he looks so content, so peaceful, she decides against it, choosing to settle in beside him instead and turn on the television.

A moment of silence passes between them until Baekhyun lifts his arm and silently pulls her closer. She should shrug his arm off, but she can’t get herself to do it.

Baekhyun’s voice is so low, gravely, though his eyes are still closed. He murmurs, “Before you overthink it, I’m not doing this to eat you. That’s too much effort for a meal.” He opens his to stare down at her and she ignores the proximity of their faces, the warmth swimming in his eyes, “Especially for a meal that’s the equivalent to, like, ing McDonald’s or something.”

She snorts, rolling her eyes. “Thanks. That’s so nice. I love knowing I’m on the same level as American fast food to you.”

He just pats her arm. “Honesty is the best policy.”

~.~.~.~.~

Being the only person super drunk in a room is always embarrassing, but now she’s both drunk and sleepy and entirely too clingy. She wraps her arms around Yixing’s waist, cheek pressed to his chest, ear resting right where his heart beats. She can’t hear his heart beating, but she can feel the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes and it’s very, very comforting. She can feel her eyelids grow heavy with sleep.

“Squeeze any harder and you’ll break my ribs.” Yixing tells her, smiling, “And as much as I love the affection, I really need those, love.”

“Are you sure?” She responds.

“Very, very sure.” Yixing replies, with a quiet laugh, his fingers dancing along her spine, playing with strands of her hair. Yixing speaks again, his words soft, though not directed at her. “Do you wanna spend the night, Baek? It’s really late.”

“You always use that as an excuse.” Baekhyun says, after a moment. “You seem to forget I’m a vampire. Sleep doesn’t matter and I’m the most dangerous thing in this city. It doesn’t matter how ing late it is.”

Baekhyun sounds exasperated, strangely enough. She lifts her head from Yixing’s chest just turn and look at Baekhyun. Under the silver moonlight, she catches a glint of deep, scarlet red and an annoyed, almost accusing glare etched across Baekhyun’s face. It’s directed at Yixing. She can tell Baekhyun is upset with Yixing and she wonders why, her drunken thoughts hazy, swimming like their faces in her vision swim. She really shouldn’t have drunk so much. She really shouldn’t have. Because Yixing’s fingers tighten, for just a moment, at her waist and suddenly Baekhyun’s gaze flicks sideways, landing on her. His eyes are so red, so piercing. There’s a pause, before Baekhyun seems to straighten his expression, soft warmth trickling into the momentary rigidity Yixing’s seemingly polite question seemed to drag out of Baekhyun.

“I’m aware of what you are.” Yixing’s voice is pointed, the volume of his tone rising the tiniest bit.

It worries her because Yixing never raises his voice, not even when he ‘s angry. Instead, he maintains a steady tone and speaks sternly, with disappointment, and she’s always found that that was always much worse to be on the receiving end of. The few times they’ve argued, he’d always be stubborn and levelheaded, though absolutely vicious, while she snapped at him left and right, and their arguments would end with the two of them going to bed angry, though they’d make up eventually. She’s bad at staying angry and though Yixing tended to hold grudges, he’d always crawl into bed and shower her in kisses. Once, he told her that he finds it hard to stay mad at her, despite how good he is at holding grudges with other people. Thankfully, they don't fight often.

Baekhyun raises a brow, challenging.

Yixing’s tone is too level, too controlled, though entirely reasonable, perhaps too reasonable. “I know you’ll be fine, but I’m worried about whoever you come across on your way back.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Your eyes.” Yixing states, tone blunt.

She squints at Baekhyun’s eyes, notices just how red the pupils are, how purple the bags under his eyes are. She doesn’t let go of Yixing—she feels safe and warm in his arms—as she interrupts, voice soft, sleepy, and a little gravely from exhaustion. “Stay the night, Baek. We still have a couple bags you left a week ago.”

There’s only one left, because he seems to have taken up her offer to call her when he doesn’t want to be alone in his apartment and she suggested he store some of his blood bags in their apartment, just in case. It’s weird, stomach always churning a bit, whenever she opens the fridge sleepily and has to ignore the hospital blood bags stacked at the back of the fridge. But she promised him she won’t make Twilight references regarding the blood bags if he keeps them stocked for him, just in case, and he had agreed readily, so she just pushes the strangeness from her mind. She notices that the days he tends to stay over usually coincides with him keying in the code to their apartment and flopping onto their couch without greeting, eyes pinned on his phone as he glares. One time, she had asked him if there was something wrong, but he had blown off her questions with a shake of his head and a pointed I’m fine, nothing’s wrong and she figured she wouldn’t push. He’d tell her eventually.

Baekhyun stares at her for a moment and there is something almost feral lighting up his red eyes. She’s never seen them so red before, never seen him look so exhausted, the purplish bags under his eyes darker than ever, resembling bruises. She blinks at him, through her sleepy, drunken haze until Yixing reaches out and tugs at Baekhyun’s sleeve, so gently, she momentarily wonders if Baekhyun will even notice Yixing’s tug.

Another moment passes before Baekhyun sighs, swallowing roughly, before he mumbles fine, and then Yixing is helping her up the stairs, laughing when she nearly trips. She glares at him for laughing until he pecks her forehead, urging her up.

Baekhyun is ahead of them—she isn’t sure when that happened—and he punches in their code with such familiar ease, it makes her chest ache.

She is the only one super drunk and clingy in the room. She embraces it, clinging to Yixing like a koala, her eyes beginning to close. Someone helps her drink water and there’s more than one pair of hands on her, at a point, especially when she nearly trips trying to get her boots off. She’s too gone to care, too drunk for her face to redden any further at the thought. Instead, she lets herself drift away, room dancing when the lights flicker on.

Yixing hums a tune under his breath as he makes her drink two glasses of water. Though she can never pinpoint where exactly the melody is from, she files it away under Top Ten Favorite Musical Pieces because anything Yixing sings is instantly her favorite.

She drifts in an out of consciousness, noticing the way Yixing pulls away from her clinging form, his warmth receding, replaced by a fluffy throw blanket that she immediately snuggles into. Still, her eyes open for a moment, blearily watching him slide to the floor right in front of her, the back of his head brushing her hip. She reaches down and plays with his hair for a moment, silence engulfing the living room before sleep starts to take her under again. Her fingers fall away from his hair when he leans. Her mind shuts down and she is only relatively aware of her surroundings. She is so exhausted. But she can hear their conversation, though it sounds as if it’s coming to her through a very long, winding tunnel, echoing in her head, distant.

She hears rustling and a low, “No.”

Is that Baekhyun? She thinks that might have been Baekhyun.

“Baek.” Yixing’s low, soothing voice is sterner usual, “You need it to stay in control and the bag isn’t enough.”

“I can—”

“You can’t…you’re…hurt…or…hye, do you?” A pause before Yixing's voice goes super low, "It's okay."

“I—.” Baekhyun mumbles. “Fine. How—look like—Fine.”

She can’t keep her eyes open, they close shut despite how hard she wants to keep her eyes open.

She falls asleep to a groan, a gentle 'S fine, and a muffled, low .

~.~.~.~.~

She wakes up to a dry, fuzzy mouth and the beginnings of a headache, so thirsty, she thinks she’ll die if she doesn’t get a glass of water right then. She rolls out of bed, stumbles a little, before she tries to remain as quiet as possible as she edges past the open door of her bedroom. She momentarily wonders how she ended up in her room before she shrugs it off. Yixing’s not in bed and she can see the faint light of the television lighting up the living room.

She peeks into the living room and she gets a sideview of Yixing and Baekhyun, their features lit an eerie blue-white, shadows falling down their faces. They’re pressed up to each other's side, video game controllers in their hands, and she can see them playing Super Smash Brothers, this time, rather than Mario Kart.

Baekhyun picks Meta Knight and Yixing mumbles, “Everyone knows playing with Meta Knight means you’re scared your opponent’s gonna kick your .”

“Well, you’ve won every round already. I’m not trying to lose again.”

“Meta Knight’s too OP, pick something else.”

“No ing way. I’m trying to win.”

She smiles to herself before she tiptoes to the kitchen. Surprisingly, neither of them seem to notice her walking around—though she figures maybe Baekhyun has noticed, but he’s chosen not to say anything, since he is a vampire with super senses. She glances around the already-lit kitchen, ignoring the empty bag of blood strewn on the counter. She’s about to grab a glass from the cabinet when she hears something that makes her freeze.

Yixing’s always been a bit straightforward with his thoughts. It’s something she’s always loved about him. But she’s surprised to hear the question slip from his lips so suddenly. She has no idea what could have prompted it, but Baekhyun seems to take it in stride. Maybe, they like talking about serious things while playing video games.

“Why have you been helping Sunhye like this? Helping us?”

She doesn’t move. is dry, and her head hurts more, but she doesn’t move. She knows eavesdropping is bad, but, well, she’s not above it.

There’s a long, long pause before Baekhyun says, “It’s not—it’s kind of dumb.”

“I doubt it.” Yixing mumbles.

Baekhyun sighs, probably from whatever look Yixing gives him, because he sounds resigned as he says, “Someone who I loved a lot, so ing much, they—uh, back then modern medicine wasn’t a thing. Iron deficient anemia could kill people back then. And the worst part—the worst ing part—is that I knew there was something wrong. I ing knew, but I had no idea how to help.”

“You could have changed them.” Yixing speaks slowly, carefully.

“I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemies.” Baekhyun scoffs, ignoring Yixing’s quiet Baek. “Besides, they didn’t want it. It’s not like the movies. No one ever wants to be a vampire, not really, and I wasn’t about to force them to turn—I’m not that much of an —”

“You’re not an , Baekhyun.”

“—I ing know how horrible that felt, how much I wanted to… I wasn’t going to make someone else go through that kind of hell, especially not someone I loved.”

“Hey.” Yixing uses his calming tone, the same tone he uses with her when she’s thinking too much and it feels like the whole world is closing in on her. Suddenly, she feels terrible for listening, for snooping in the kitchen like this. “Hey, it’s—it’s okay. It wasn’t—do you think it was your fault, Baek?”

It’s silent for a long, long time, before Baekhyun says, voice rough, gravely, the video game long forgotten, “Everyone dies, from old age or disease, and I can smell and taste it on them. I know it’s going to happen before it happens. And I could never ing do a thing about it.”

“You did something for Sunhye—no, don’t give me that ing look, listen to me—God knows how bad it could have gotten, especially with her heart. You went out of your way to help her—to help us. You saved one person and, maybe, you managed to save other people over these past few centuries, too. From what I’ve gotten to know about you, I think you save people without knowing.” Yixing pauses and she hears shuffling, the sofa creaking softly with their movements, perhaps Yixing turning fully to face Baekhyun. “Death happens. People pass away. You’re not a bad person because you get to keep living. You’re not a bad person for living.”

“I’m so ing stupid.” Baekhyun mumbles and she’s surprised to hear how thick his voice sounds, how rough, how he almost sounds as if he’s crying. She feels even worse now for eavesdropping, so she forgoes the water, turning away from the kitchen, her thoughts reeling. “I’m an immortal. I’m supposed to be detached. I’m supposed to be over all this humanity bull. But, I’m just tired and I have so many regrets.”

“And, you feel guilty for being alive.” Yixing’s voice is behind her now, quieter, sadder. Her eyes sting at that sentence, at Baekhyun’s loud, sharp intake of breath.

“Yeah.” He whispers. It’s quiet as she pads further away.

“Baekhyun, that's—” Yixing’s voice settles into a muffled, indecipherable sound as she steps into her room and curls up in the blankets.

She curls into her blankets and rubs her head, trying to soothe the headache as she tries to think. It makes sense—Baekhyun’s behavior, how irritable he always is, though she knows him to be incredibly gentle and hyperaware of her and their surroundings all the time. She tries to think of anything other than Baekhyun’s survivor’s guilt—because that's what it is—tries to imagine what that must feel like. She’s certain he’s loved a lot of people over his different lifetimes. She can’t imagine losing that many people, both romantic and platonic loves, over and over, let alone knowing when they’re about to be lost to him and unable to do a thing. No wonder he chooses to be alone in that apartment of his.

She brushes away stray tears, her heart heavy in her chest, weighing her down, making her wish she could just sink through the bed and into the floor, disappear, instead of feeling his sadness in such a visceral, almost intimate way, alone here in her dark room in the dead of night.

She falls asleep fitfully that night. When she wakes up, she feels like she hadn’t slept at all. Baekhyun stares at her when she stumbles out the bedroom, following the smell of hangover soup, stomach grumbling loudly. She can feel his eyes trailing after her. She avoids his gaze, ashamed.

Yixing slides her a glass of water, coupled with a tiny kiss to her hairline, and Baekhyun hands her a steaming bowl of soup. She blinks at him for a moment too long, eyes lingering, heart swelling in her chest.

Baekhyun’s red-brown eyes pause, steady on her, before he turns to spoon Yixing a bowl as well.

Baekhyun, she notices, is wearing one of Yixing’s sweatshirts—her favorite sweatshirt of Yixing’s, actually.

Baekhyun says, “A herd of elephants could sneak around better than you, you know.”

She blinks, blushing immediately, head dropping down so she can stare at her soup in shame.

Yixing frowns around a spoonful of soup. “What are you talking about?”

Baekhyun’s tone is playful, though there is something there, an edge to it that makes it hard for her to face him. She’s embarrassed she was caught. She feels a hand on her head, gently patting down her bedhead. She peeks up at him, trying to convey that she’s sorry for eavesdropping.

(She really should have known Baekhyun would hear her. He’s a vampire, for God’s sake.)

“I just never noticed how loud her footsteps are until now.”

Yixing snorts, bumping shoulders with her while Baekhyun drops his hand. “The cutest part is that she thinks she’s being quiet.”

Baekhyun laughs. Sunhye grumbles. Yixing grins.

~.~.~.~.~

happens. She used to say that so often, back when she would hook up with anyone she was attracted to, trying to fill the growing hole in her heart with the only way she knew how. happens. It’s what she used to say to Yixing, shrugging, never noticing the way his eyes would widen or he’d sigh or how quiet he’d get. happens. It’s what he had told her when his casual just friends relationship became a long-time thing and she felt like he had her heart in a vice grip every time he’d bring her around their shared apartment, their shared friend group, their shared lives. happens.

In reality, doesn’t just happen. There is always a warning, a lead-up that she would have noticed if she just looked.

(She should have stepped back when their gazes lingered for far too long, when every other sentence morphed into flirting, when she thought it wouldn’t be a big deal to pretend like the first, drunken kiss-turned-vampire-discovery didn’t happen. Yet she hadn’t stepped back.)

happens.

They’re at the grocery store, waiting in line to checkout, and she can feel eyes on her. She looks up and she meets unfamiliar eyes, just staring at her. It’s strange. The eyes are full of—

Someone waves a hand over her eyes, whistling to catch her attention. She spins, grabbing his hand, and Baekhyun blinks down at her, head tilted to the side. “You okay?” He asks.

She glances back in the direction of the bread aisle and no one is there, so she nods.

This is normal. This is like every single one of their other grocery runs.

(Except it isn’t. For one, she’s still holding his hand, gripping his cool, pretty fingers unconsciously. He doesn’t make a move to pull away. Second, instead of dumping all the groceries on her just so he can laugh at her momentary struggle, Baekhyun takes most of them, effortlessly carrying them off the conveyor belt and to the car, his strides matching hers as he listens to her recount her day.)

It’s dark, now, the gentle summer breeze tickling her skin. She finds her eyes drawn to Baekhyun. He’s dressed simply, in a t-shirt and jeans, outfit slightly more colorful than it usually is. There’s a healthy glow to his skin, his eyes such a warm, earthy brown that she can’t even imagine someone like him could be a vampire. He purses his pink lips and she finds her eyes are drawn to that movement.

Why are they drawn to that movement?

She doesn’t allow herself to dwell on that. She never lets herself dwell on those moments, though, in retrospect, she should have.

(Maybe, she could have caught it before it grew into something too big to ignore.)

In the confines of the car, blanketed by the tinkling of soft classical music, they fall into a comfortable silence. They don’t speak again until they’re in her empty apartment, until she ignores the disapproving look from the Auntie who lives two floors down as they trudge up the stairs, until Baekhyun places all the grocery bags on the counter, and, without being asked, Baekhyun starts to sort the groceries, putting them away with an ease that says he’s done this a million times before. He has, she knows he has, but it still surprises her, how familiar he is with her kitchen and her apartment.

She grabs a glass of water and watches him work, an odd emotion bubbling up in her chest at the sight. There is something so intimate about the sight, something that sinks into her gut and leaves an unfamiliar taste in . It almost tastes good—he almost looks good, as if he, maybe, just maybe, belongs there. He’s doing something so mundane, yet it makes her breathless. Her eyes dart over his pushed back, messy hair, the focused furrow between his brows as he busies himself, not once asking her where she puts the bell peppers or which cabinet Yixing likes to have his protein powder in. Her gaze flickers down, to his feet, and he’s wearing a pair of slippers he had left at their apartment weeks ago and never remembered to take back. The slippers, a familiar fixture by her door, one she now tends to glance down at just to check if Baekhyun is over or not, is such a mundane detail, but it sends her into a spiral, of sorts. It inexplicably reminds her of how he left his toothbrush in their bathroom, too, lying beside their in the cup beside the sink. Yixing’s is green, hers is purple, and Baekhyun’s is yellow. How some mornings she’d accidentally pick up Baekhyun’s toothbrush before catching her mistake.

She turns away, still clutching the glass in her hands, and her brain registers too many details, all at once, and her vision, her thoughts, twist and turn, coiling together, wound up tight. She feels like she is wound up tight, poised to spring at any moment, her brain relishing in the details, finding comfort there, perhaps.

Details, details, details. A plaid flannel throw blanket she had stolen from Baekhyun’s couch is draped across her old butterfly chair. There’s a third video game controller sitting on the coffee table countertop. Old, worn books piled up on the dining room table, a few dog-eared, some in languages neither Yixing nor her can read. One of her old magazines sandwiched in between those books. Tossed on the floor is a black hoodie—she racks her brain, trying to remember whose it is, but she can’t, she can’t. Is it hers, is it Yixing’s, is it Baekhyun’s? It’s been tossed there, so carelessly, so casually, and she thinks of the extra slippers waiting to be worn when she comes home first. She scrambles for an explanation. Whose hoodie is that? She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know and that is so daunting. It’s so—it’s so—

She spins, trying to shake it all away, trying to settle her racing thoughts and beating heart, but then she remembers the extra pillows piled up at the foot of the couch, the folded blanket that isn’t theirs (Yixing’s nor Sunhye’s). She pivots on her heels, whirling around to fully face the sink, meaning to put her cup away, but then she sees Baekhyun’s cute little corgi shaped mug on the counter. His wine glass. They just sit there. Right next to Yixing’s favorite mug (a #1 DAD mug she got him as a joke that he enjoys a bit too much—when Baekhyun had seen it, he had raised a brow, looked at her pointedly, and she had threatened his life if he dared make a daddy joke). Right next to her reusable water bottle she likes to carry everywhere. Mundane, unnoticeable objects that have somehow become these paramount symbols she cannot and does not want to fathom. An overwhelming pressure builds in her chest as she stares and stares and stares.

Back before Yixing, before her discovery of vampires, before the answers to her constant fatigue came in the form of iron deficient anemia, she’d have looked at a friend’s situation like this and responded, happens. She used to wholeheartedly believe in that.

happens.

But, does not just happen. They build. They ebb and creep and slowly but surely create a chain of events, until that one particular moment becomes this absolute, guaranteed truth that had bloomed from the smallest of seeds. And the only reason why it’ll feel so sudden, that supreme truth, is because the chain of events are all mundane, unnoticeable moments that stack up, one on top of another, until there’s a towering mountain teetering over you. Then the mountain falls and you are hit with a realization, an epiphany of sorts, and you know you are ed, you are in too deep and you are ed.

“.” She blinks at the word that leaves —she’s even adapted to his way of speaking—and she cannot believe how—he’s so— “.”

(He is strewn about their apartment, her life, so very there and so ing entangled. He is there in the smallest details and he belongs and it sends her thoughts into wild disarray.)

Baekhyun’s head pops up from behind the fridge door, frowning at her as he closes it slowly, the dull thud echoing throughout the kitchen. “Sunny, are you okay?”

She can’t stop staring at him—maybe in awe, maybe in fear, she isn’t sure. All she can think about is how he is everywhere, he is everywhere. All she can wonder about is, why am I so okay with it? Underneath the fear of the realization, there is a sort of anticipation clinging to her.

(For a moment, she wonders if there’s anything wrong about him being so there, being everywhere.)

She inhales sharply when he takes a step towards her.

He takes another step and she falters, backing away unconsciously. He steps forward, she steps back, back and forth back and forth, like a dance, until her back hits the counter too soon. She stares at him, half-hoping he’ll keep pressing forward, but he pauses, just an arm-length from her, in the middle of the kitchen, groceries long forgotten.

Baekhyun’s always-careful gaze settles over her, piercing in its intensity, even when his eyes are lit up with curiosity, with a glimmer amusement, as he murmurs, voice low, too low, “What are you thinking?”

In the many months she’s know Baekhyun, he’s never spoken to her like this, with a lazy, curious, melodic drawl that drags out a deep blush from her, that makes her knees wobble, her fingers gripping the edge of the counter behind her so tightly, her knuckles turn white.

“It’s—it’s stupid.” She stumbles over her response. She’s never this flustered around him. At least she hopes she never is.

Baekhyun’s lips twitch at whatever he sees on her face, even as he shakes his head and replies, tone gentle, “Don’t say that. The things you say aren't stupid.”

(She knows he jokes around when he calls her an idiot. The look on his face tells her that he is rethinking each and every one of those moments just because of what she had just said. Her heart seems to swell at the look on his face, the flicker of sincerity and warmth in his eyes that she doesn’t get to see too often.)

“I just—” Her tense shoulders droop as she takes a deep breath and decides to give in. The pout stretching out his lips makes her heart skip too many beats. She unclasps a hand from the counter behind her and jabs a thumb at the cups behind her. “You’re here.” She sweeps a hand behind her, gesturing at the things, all of those mundane, tiny thing, afraid she just looks like a flailing mess to him. She gestures widely around her, in his direction, nearly smacking Baekhyun in the chest in the process. “You’re over there. Over here. You’re everywhere.”

There’s a brief second of confusion filling his eyes, confusion and hurt that makes her want to reach out and massage the furrowed brows away.

His gaze sweeps behind her, lingers on the cups, lingers on her face. She thinks she’s going to cry—is it just her? Is she the only one who’s noticed this? Will she be left to deal with it on her own? Or left to realize that she’s making everything about her and being ridiculous and reading everything wrong like she always does?

Then Baekhyun’s eyes widen, his mouth falling open into a small ‘o’.

Baekhyun blinks, the movement languid, slow, before he drags a pretty hand through his hair, his pretty fingers tangling in his hair as he rubs the back of his neck with his other hand—a gesture she learned a while ago meant that he was worried (he tended to act this way whenever he appeared in their apartment with his eyes plastered on his phone and a scowl etched in near-permanence across his face.

He takes a deep breath, opens his mouth, before snapping it shut, three times, before he finally manages a soft, “Oh.”

“Yeah.” She responds, swallowing down the growing lump in . She wants to ask what this realization means, because she doesn’t want to dwell on the meaning, but she’s almost afraid of what she will hear.

There’s another pause, this time infinitely more awkward, more drawn out, more filled with darting eyes, with Baekhyun unable to meet her gaze for a long, long moment.

“Does that bother you?”

She’s startled by his voice. She thought he wouldn’t say anything. She thought they would devolve into complete silence, unbroken, encompassing, swallowing them and the friendship that developed between them and spitting out the bones as a warning, as a way to remind her of the lesson: this is what happens when you get greedy.

She blinks. Does it bother her? Does it?

(It doesn’t. It doesn’t, it doesn’t, it doesn’t, and she is so awful for that, isn’t she? She’s so awful for knowing it’s bad, but not caring as much as she should.)

Her words escape before she can think them over.

“That’s the problem.” She whispers, suddenly unable to meet his eyes, unable to look at anything but the kitchen tiles at her feet. She really needs to find time to give the floor a thorough mopping. “I—I don’t know if it does.”

He blinks at her and his voice sounds so vulnerable, so tiny, so human. It is nothing like the boy she’s come to know these past few months, but, at the same time, it absolutely is. She knows it is because she catches glimpses of this vulnerability. Sometimes she sees it, sometimes she hears it. Her heart swells and swells and it feels as if her chest will burst with the pressure of it. “You really don’t know?” He asks, voice smooth as velvet, gentle as the summer breeze.

She should nod. She should say, yes, I don’t know. I’m confused. I’m confused.

But she’s not as confused as her morals want her to be. She’s just afraid that the moment she admits it out loud, everything will be out there. Everyone will know.

But her heart feels like it is being clawed at, from the inside, and the pressure in her chest is so overwhelming, the way Baekhyun blinks at her, with melting eyes the color of honey and roses, the way he takes the smallest step closer, it leaves her feeling as if she will burst at the seams if she holds it in any longer.

(She can hear Irene’s voice in her head, scolding her, Who cares what other people think? Who the cares, Sunhye?)

She’ll burst if she doesn’t say it, at least. Then it’ll be out there, and she can finally work through it, finally figure her out, and focus on Yixing. She can finally stop feeling so goddamn guilty around Yixing.

Baekhyun takes another step forward, until he stands so close, she can feel the coolness of his body against her hot skin. She blinks, startled, eyes flickering up to meet his.

Her thoughts malfunction, slowing down for the first time in a long long time, and she blinks at him, stares and stares while he slowly, carefully, movements languid and drawn out, lifts a hand and reaches for her face.

He is giving her a chance to stop it, to break away and end this, end the way her heart feels like it’s trying to escape from her chest, the shiver that crawls down her back, the way cold water trickles down one’s back after a shower, trailing down her spine one nook at a time.

(In that moment there is no one else but Baekhyun and her. There are no worries, no anxieties, nothing but the anticipation filling her up, up, up to the brim, the ghost-like feeling of his fingers against her cheeks.)

His pretty fingers hover. He does not quite touch, his eyes searching hers for permission.

She lets out a breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding as she nods, once, just once, she nods, and a switch seems to flip in him. He crowds her against the counter, his fingers fluttering across her jaw, finding purchases in her hair as he presses his lips to hers. She kisses back.

She kisses back.

All the pressure, the overwhelming feelings building inside her, bursts and she’s a frenzy of motion. At first, the kiss is awkward, all teeth and too hurried, until she finds purchase in his hair, another hand curling around his shirt, crumpling the material between her fingers, her legs wrapping around his waist. He presses forward and the counter digs into her back, even he on her bottom lip, tugs a bit too hard on her hair, enough to elicit and low moan out of her. He smiles against her lips. She is lost in him, remembers the feeling of his lips against hers, a long lost memory that had lingered within her, even in her drunken, terrified state from earlier. She kisses him back, he hikes her up on the counter, one of his hands slips from her hair, to her waist, braces her against the counter so she doesn’t fall back and hit her head on the cabinets and—

Crash.

She yelps. He pulls away. She blinks, mesmerized by his swollen, glossy lips, his messy hair, the way his eyes are a darker shade, more red than brown now. His chest heaves despite the fact that he doesn’t need to breathe and she feels so, so breathless. He laughs, a small quiet chuckle. She can’t help but smile in response.

She tears her gaze off his, to assess whatever the hell just fell, to catch her breath, when she registers what had fallen.

It’s Yixing’s favorite mug, the one she bought her. Thankfully it just tipped over into the sink and nothing was broken, but the sight of the mug snaps her back to reality so ing fast, like emotional whiplash.

Her eyes widen. She touches her lips. Panic settles in her gut.

“Holy .” She whispers, her gaze flickering to meet Baekhyun’s. Baekhyun’s looking at the mug too and there’s a crestfallen look in his eyes as well, a look of concern that matches how she feels on this inside.

All she can think is, she did it again. She’s just—she’s just cheated on Yixing. Sober.

Baekhyun says, very carefully, as he backs away from her. “I should go.”

His voice is husky, rough, and she hates that she likes it. She hates that she’s done this.

Most of all, she hates that for those brief moments leading up to everything, Yixing hadn’t existed at all. It had only been her and Baekhyun. For once, Yixing wasn’t there and that is so unsettling, so terrifying, in and of itself.

Baekhyun murmurs, “I’m sorry.”

She can’t breathe.

The front door clicks shut, and she pulls her knees to her chest, fingers pressed to her temples. She thinks, what have I done?

~.~.~.~.~

“I need your help.” She’s panicking. She’s panicking and she knows she couldn’t hold back her crumbling expression nor the fear, the anguish, filling her to the brim, no matter how hard she tried to, because Irene is quick to snap her laptop shut, packing her bags immediately. Even Jaehyun, who had been sprawled out sideways on the chair with his laptop balanced precariously on his knee, and Eunwoo, who is slumped halfway down the chair with his hood covering his hair and his face buried in his textbook (something she knows he does because he’s tired of people staring at him wherever he goes just because he’s pretty), both scramble upright to look at her. Jaehyun nearly drops his laptop in his haste to straighten up and Eunwoo grabs it before it hits the ground, the move so smooth, nonchalant, and drama-like that, under normal circumstances, Sunhye might have made fun of him for it. Right now, she’s just—she’s panicking.

Eunwoo looks so very concerned, his hood settling around his face and his kind eyes searching her face, when he whispers, “Sunhye, what’s wrong?”

Irene is the one to grab her elbow, before Sunhye can stutter through a nothing, I’m fine. “Let’s go outside and talk. And breathe, Sunhye.”

Sunhye nods, nods and nods, a little too franticly, her eyes on Irene and she tosses her bag on the chair she had been sitting on. She doesn’t miss the look Jaehyun and Eunwoo exchange, even as Irene starts to steer her away from their table. Irene glances back at them, “Watch my stuff, please?”

Jaehyun nods, fumbling with his fingers as he opens his mouth before shutting it. Eunwoo just stares after them. Sunhye tries to give them a reassuring smile, but she’s sure she just looks like she’s being stabbed. It certainly does nothing to alleviate the concern in their eyes—if anything, it makes it worse.

Irene grips her by the shoulders and steers her to a ledge next to the library. It’s dreary out, the air dust levels higher than usual, leaving her lungs feeling heavier than they already are.

“You need to breathe.” Irene states.

“I’m trying. The air quality just today.” She responds, voice hoarse.

Irene ignores her poor attempt at a joke, examining her expression. A moment passes, and then another, before Irene’s eyes widen and settles into a thin line. “You have got to be ing kidding me.”

Sunhye frowns, “I didn’t even say anything.”

“I know you better than anyone else, aside from Yixing and your parents.” Irene’s tone is level, very controlled, but there is a tinge of something there, something very cutting. She’s always hated confrontation with Irene, only because Irene always knows exactly what to say to cut through any bull she tries to spout. Irene is all honesty and observations and being able to read Sunhye like the back of her hand, never bothering to spare her feelings eighty-five percent of the time, and Sunhye isn’t good at handling any of those things unless she’s in the right mindset. And, currently, she sure as hell isn’t in the right mindset for a blunt Bae Irene.

“The last time you were this upset, it was because of Yixing. Before you were dating.” Irene is speaking slowly, as if she’s allowing Sunhye the chance to speak up already. Sunhye can’t. Irene’s eyes narrow as she continues, “When he was always breaking your heart.”

Sunhye doesn’t say anything. How is she supposed to say this? How is she supposed to say that Yixing didn’t break her heart, no, instead, she will be breaking his. She broke his trust. She’s breaking her own damn heart.

“Did Yixing break up with you?” Irene sighs, running a hand through her hair. She appears to have deflated, wildly grasping for questions as if she knows Sunhye won’t speak up otherwise. Irene will have to pry it out of her. Sunhye feels bad; she doesn’t want to bother Irene, doesn’t want to play twenty questions for something as ridiculous as her own stupidity, bad choices, and greed when Irene obviously has to study, but Sunhye’s mouth won’t work and her heart is lodged in .

Sunhye shakes her head.

“Did you two fight?” Irene asks, gently. She shakes her head. Irene sighs, “Hye, you need to tell me what’s wrong so I can help you.”

“It was me. It’s all me.” Sunhye manages, finally, finally.

Irene freezes before she asks, so very slowly, carefully, like she’s approaching a ticking time bomb ready to set off any moment, “Did you—what did you do?”

“Something stupid.” Sunhye mumbles, sighing then. “Something so ing stupid.”

“You’re always doing something stupid.” Irene responds, almost reflexively, “You need to specify.”

Sunhye takes a deep breath before she recounts everything. The grocery run, the kiss, everything.

Irene stares at her as if she’s grown another head.

It’s quiet then, between the two of them, so so quiet, before Irene simply mutters, “.”

“Yeah.” Sunhye responds, rubbing her temples, her exhaustion running bone-deep.

Irene looks slightly confused as she peers at Sunhye, opening to say something when her phone buzzes, no doubt a text from Jaehyun or Eunwoo since they’re supposed to be in class soon. She watches Irene type out a quick response, thumbs flying across the screen, before she tucks her phone into her skirt pocket and looks up at Sunhye, eyes filled with disappointment and pity.

Irene says, her tone stern, dead serious. “You don’t need my help, do you? I mean…you have to already know what you need to do.”

Sunhye stares at Irene, eyes wide, because Irene is right, she’s always right, but Sunhye doesn’t want her to be right. She doesn’t want to acknowledge what she’s done. She wanted Irene to comfort her—though perhaps Sunhye’s subconscious knew she should go to Irene because that exactly what Irene won’t do. Sunhye hunches where she’s sitting, wrapping her arms around her torso. “I know.” She says, blinking rapidly.

“You shouldn’t have done that to him.” Irene continues, sighing slighting, stepping closer, voice infinitely gentler, though Sunhye really doesn’t think she deserves that kindness.

Sunhye rubs her arms, “I know.”

Irene wraps her arms around Sunhye, pressing a kiss to her forehead, “You’re such an idiot.” She says, with no bite whatsoever. Somehow, Irene sounds just as tired as Sunhye feels.

Still, Sunhye chokes up as she stutters, tears filling her eyes, “I—I know.”

Irene gently rocks her side-to-side for a long moment before she pulls away. Sunhye wipes at her cheeks, just as Jaehyun and Eunwoo appear behind Irene, Irene’s backpack slung over Eunwoo’s shoulder. Irene glances back at them, waving them over, before she turns back to Sunhye and speaks, stern, disappointed-mother-voice back full force, “Go apologize. Go fix it.”

Sunhye nods, quickly, hopping off the ledge.

“Fix what?” Jaehyun asks, glancing between the two of them.

“Thanks for watching my stuff.” Irene blatantly ignores Jaehyun’s question and Sunhye slips away before Jaehyun or Eunwoo have time to turn on her, Eunwoo’s whiny What’s going on, Irene? echoing behind her as she hurries away.

Sunhye’s skin crawls with nerves and trepidation.

She needs to fix it. She needs to apologize. She’s just afraid that, in her attempt to fix it, she’ll destroy everything.

a/n: The last part will take longer since I'm not totally done with it! But ksjfndkjsa I'm so nervous about how this fic is going, please let me know your thoughts, thanks! I love you guys <3 also uhhhh here's the angst lolll skjnfka