The Cinematic Orchestra - Arrival of the Birds & Transformation

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A single ray of sunshine fell upon his tired body, advancing slowly but steadily to envelop his cold limbs in its bright iridescent light.

 

Breath filled his lungs as he stirred slowly, feeling soft cotton under his fingertips as sounds filtered into his subconsciousness slowly but surely. Chirping birds right outside the window, enjoying the brightness that spring brought along, as well as cars honking, builders at work on the apartments down the road.

 

A heavy arm was slung around his waist, a leg comfortably tangled in between his own, and breaths of hot air were puffed against the nape of his neck. Baekhyun felt warm and peaceful while he blinked himself awake to see the sunlight reflecting on the pure white of the sheets surrounding him.

 

It bathed the bed in a warm light, made everything a little more beautiful than it would have been on a cloudy day, and Baekhyun closed his eyes on a smile as he pressed his nose into the pillow to smell the distinct scent of his boyfriend.

 

It was then, with his eyes closed and head full of Chanyeol, that everything came rushing back to him. The meadow leading to a graveyard, a broken-hearted Chanyeol with tears in his eyes, him picture on the coffin…

 

All of it came rushing in like a movie played on fast forward, and by the end of it Baekhyun had thrown himself out of bed as the rush of it made him want to crawl out of his own skin. His feet thumped against the floor, but still his heartbeat overruled the sound even as he gracelessly stumbled backwards until his back hit the narrow wall in between their windows.

 

From there he stared at Chanyeol’s sleeping form on their bed, drinking in the sight of the love of his life as he needed to see that he was no longer crying, only sleeping peacefully. This wasn’t that dream.

 

Baekhyun laughed a little breathlessly, hands coming up to touch his own face, to slide his fingers across his chest and stomach checking for any stabwounds. But he was fine, just perfect, and the realisation that it had only been a dream was so overwhelmingly relieving that Baekhyun’s legs gave way.

 

He slid down against the wall, heaving a sob of reprieve as he dropped his head in his hands and cried. He cried like a little baby, overcome with exhilaration because he was alive. He was alive and well with Chanyeol in his bed, it had only been a nightmare.

 

The sobbing woke up his lover soon enough, and if Baekhyun hadn’t been so loud he would have heard the rustling of the sheets as Chanyeol all but flung himself out of bed to get to him.

 

His knees skidded across the ground painfully, crashing into the floor in such a way that Baekhyun was sure would leave abrasions, but his boyfriend didn’t even seem to notice as his hands were on Baekhyun’s immediately, pulling them away from his tear stricken face so he could look at him.

 

“Baek, hey, baby, what’s wrong? Baek, why are you crying?” Chanyeol’s large and worried eyes scanned his entire face and then his body, “are you hurt anywhere? Baek, please talk to me, or show me, you’re scaring me, baby.”

 

Upon hearing his voice, Baekhyun only cried harder, feeling more lightweight with every small touch and each mention of his name. God, the pain he had felt thinking he had lost everything, thinking his life had been over, had felt so real.

 

But it hadn’t been real. Thank god it hadn’t been real.

 

Unable to bring out words that would explain just how emotional he was and why, Baekhyun wrapped his arms around Chanyeol’s neck and pushed himself forward enough that he stumbled into his boyfriend’s hold.

 

They fell over together, but all Baekhyun did was hold on tightly, pressing closer to his lover in whichever way he possibly could, and so Chanyeol wrapped his arms around him and simply held him, showing just how patient he could be.

 

Baekhyun cried until he had run out of tears, until his body was shivering with cold, and only then did Chanyeol decide enough was enough and carefully sit them upright. With Baekhyun still in his lap he brushed the tears from his face, never straying too far to lose the touch between them, as if he knew it was what Baekhyun needed now.

 

“Come on, let me get you to bed, you’re trembling all over,” Chanyeol whispered to him, their noses pressed together in a way he knew calmed his boyfriend, and Baekhyun nodded but also took that exact moment to kiss him. To lock their lips and steal his mouth because he needed to feel this was real, he needed those lips to move in sync with his.

 

And they did. Chanyeol didn’t ask why he needed it, he simply kissed him back, putting in his everything as if it was both the first and last kiss they’d ever share. It left Baekhyun breathless, fingers tugging on his lover’s hair and earning himself a whimper that hadn’t been there in the dream.

 

Chanyeol was real, and Baekhyun was alive. They were in their room, both breathing and able to touch and kiss and love, and Baekhyun wanted to do so in ways he had never before. He never wanted to let go again, never wanted to stop caressing, but breath was necessary and so eventually they parted.

 

Baekhyun pressed his face into the crook of his boyfriend’s neck, and Chanyeol squeezed his arms around him as he said, “hold on, okay? I’m going to get us up.”

 

With his strength he turned them, getting himself on his knees, and Baekhyun wrapped his legs around the taller’s waist so he’d be a little lighter and easier to hold. It helped Chanyeol as he stood, only a little shaky on his legs as he got both feet on the floor.

 

The Cinematic Orchestra - Soda 

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It didn’t take long before they reached the bed, and Chanyeol laid him on the mattress, down on his back, but before Baekhyun could complain about him moving away too far, his legs were spread by large hands, warm on his thighs, and his lover crawled between them.

 

He pressed a kiss to Baekhyun’s chin and then the dip between his collar bones, before he lowered his upper body on top of Baekhyun’s, being mindful of not putting his full weight on the boy and crushing him.

 

Leaning on his palms, Chanyeol looked down at him with that same distressed look, and Baekhyun could see the fear in them because he didn’t know, he couldn’t know, what was going through Baekhyun’s mind in that moment.

 

The smaller brought up both his hands to cup Chanyeol’s cheeks, the way he had done in his dream, but this time he got a response in the form of his lover twisting his head until he could kiss Baekhyun’s palm, and that got him to choke up.

 

“I love you,” he whispered, sounding pained enough to bring back the frown on Chanyeol’s forehead, “I love you so much. I was so scared, but you’re here. And I’m here, and it’s okay.” He smiled, hoping that seeing it would make Chanyeol a little less concerned.

 

It didn’t.

 

And so Baekhyun swallowed around the lump in his throat and tried to explain the best he could, “I had a dream. I woke up in a field, which was right next to a graveyard, and when I walked around I found a funeral was taking place. My funeral.”

 

Distress flickered across Chanyeol’s eyes as he once again took in Baekhyun’s face, and the smaller his thumb along a cheekbone, “you were there, with Jongin and Sehun, and you were crying. I- you couldn’t see me. I was watching you hurt, I hurt, and there was nothing I could do.”

 

Chanyeol shut him up with a kiss, not wanting to hear more, and Baekhyun pulled him in closer until all he could feel, all he could breathe was him. His heart was exploding in his chest, stomach tingling with how loved he felt in that moment, because the dream had made him realise that little bit more, how Chanyeol was the one.

 

He traced his lover’s spine with tender fingers, let them roam everywhere they could reach in order to simply feel him this close. And if he could, he’d never leave this moment, because love was all he needed and all he would need for the rest of time. Love was oxygen, what kept him - them -  alive.

 

Chanyeol’s fingers tickled as they moved along his thighs in return, the touch just as loving, until they gripped him behind his knees to pull him down on the bed. The move brought them closer together, and Chanyeol whispered against Baekhyun’s lips as he was within reach, “don’t make me think about losing you, just don’t. I don’t want to imagine.”

 

It pulled a whine from Baekhyun’s lips as Chanyeol kissed the corner of his mouth, peppered his face in more doting pecks, “it’s the worst pain, the absolute worst,” Baekhyun murmured as he arched his back and tipped his head to the side, “nothing compares to it.”

 

“You’re mine forever, though, have I told you that?” Chanyeol briefly paused to look into Baekhyun’s eyes, as if he wanted to see the truth in his reply, and although he was being distracted by the fingers that brushed across his stomach, Baekhyun remembered the dream clearly.

 

“You have in my dream,” he replied as his left thumb searched for his ring finger, feeling for something that wasn’t there, “you- had a ring on you. Said you had wanted to ask me to marry you, to grow old with you, but then I-” he swallowed the last of the words, and Chanyeol looked away.

 

And not just look away, but move away entirely too, making Baekhyun wonder for a moment if he had said something wrong.

 

He sat up when Chanyeol slid so far away that his entire upper body was out of the bed, hanging down to the floor.

 

Baekhyun could hear a drawer being opened and closed and then Chanyeol grumbling to himself as he tried to climb back on the bed. Baekhyun helped, pulled at his pyjama bottoms, the only thing he was wearing, to get him back on there.

 

When his boyfriend sat back up, cheeks red from the blood having gone to his head, Chanyeol took a moment to just stare at him. Because his boyfriend went soft, his eyes doing that thing where pure love seemed to be radiating from them, and Baekhyun felt a blush bloom in his cheeks.

 

Then, when Baekhyun had forgotten about everything else around him, Chanyeol grabbed his hand and held it in his own, his thumb brushing across Baekhyun’s knuckles as he continued to smile.

 

“Well, this isn’t exactly what I had imagined this to go like,” he chuckled and shuffled a little closer, keeping his eyes on Baekhyun’s. “But Baekhyun,” he said in that amazingly soft way only Chanyeol could, and Baekhyun froze because he remembered.

 

His boyfriend kept on smiling as he brought up his other hand to brush the smaller’s hair out of his face with his index finger, and Baekhyun remembered that too.

 

“Oh,” he brought out, his hear having jumped all the way up into his throat as he watched Chanyeol’s bashful look being directed at the hand he was holding. It was happening, like really happening, and Baekhyun was about to cry.

 

“Remember how we met at Jongin and Sehun’s wedding? And how, even though we had just met, we talked about what we’d want our weddings to be like on the way to my - now our - apartment?” Chanyeol asked, a tender smile on his face.

 

“No,” Baekhyun replied, but it wasn’t a no to the question Chanyeol had asked him, “you’re not- Chanyeol…” he keened, his heart fluttering so fast, like the wings of a mockingbird, and it didn’t seem to stop.

 

Chanyeol paid him no mind, though, he continued with his speech which was so much like the one from Baekhyun’s dream, “I remember you telling me you want to marry in white, and how there should be tulips everywhere. Not lillies, like my stupid brought you, but tulips.”

 

He smiled, raised Baekhyun’s hand to his lips so he could kiss his skin, “and I remember it all because I knew. I knew back then that you were it, the one, whatever you want to call it... Like I told you the night we met, sometimes all it takes is a glance.”

 

When Baekhyun didn’t look up to meet his gaze, Chanyeol tipped up his chin to make him, and this time Baekhyun stopped breathing. Because the love of his life was sitting there with eyes wet with tears, looking so proud and happy, that he couldn’t stop watching him even if he tried.

 

“Baek, I love you,” Chanyeol spoke, the warmth bleeding into his voice, and he fumbled with the hand that wasn’t holding Baekhyun’s until he got a hold of what was in his palm. He caught it between his thumb and pointer finger and held it up for Baekhyun to see, the sleek band and tiny diamonds sparkling at him.

 

The ring was exactly what Baekhyun remembered it to be, which was odd and should make him question everything about that dream, but all he could do was blink at it and wait for that final question to be asked. Which Chanyeol did only seconds later.

 

“Will you agree to be mine forever? Pretty please? And by that I mean, will you marry me, Byun Baekhyun?”

 

The fact that he looked nervous in the moment he asked, as if Baekhyun would say no to him, was ridiculous, and so his boyfriend didn’t keep him waiting for an answer.

 

“Yes, oh my god, yes. Yes, yes, yes, Chanyeol. I’m not going to stop saying it. Yes,” he laughed, finally able to really say the words he had wanted the man to hear even back in his dream, “yes, a million trillion, billion times.”

 

Chanyeol released a breath in the sound of a laugh and he squeezed Baekhyun’s hand as his shoulders slumped, relieved of the tension. His fingers were trembling as he lifted their hold so he could slide the ring into place, and Baekhyun watched as he did.

 

Once it fit snugly on baekhyun’s finger, they stared at his hand together, at the bright little stones and the gold, looking delicate on his small hand. But then Chanyeol seemed to realise what it meant, that Baekhyun had actually said yes to him, and he tugged his lover into his arms so quickly the world spun for a moment.

 

He kissed Baekhyun’s face, leaving loud smacking sounds whenever his lips would move to the next spot, and Baekhyun giggled in his arms as he pouted his lips, waiting for a real kiss to sweep him off his feet.

 

When it came, when their lips locked, it was dizzying and full of passion, quickly moving past the stage of innocent and becoming something darker. Something that showed just how desperate they were to love each other, close not being close enough.

 

The flick of a tongue against his lower lip made him weak, and he opened up for his lover immediately, allowing the kiss to deepen. They rolled over with lips still attached, until Baekhyun lay under his lover once again, hands coming up to rest on Chanyeol’s back and hips pushing up to meet his.

 

He wanted, for every touch of Chanyeol’s fingers left a scorching mark and made him see red hot with desire. He wanted because for a little while, in his mind, he had felt like he would never have this again.

 

For in his dream things had seemed hopeless, but now they appeared brighter than ever. As bright as the brilliant stones in the engagement ring now on his finger, like the sun bathing their skin in light.

 

And as Chanyeol into him, their bodies moving together beautifully, he drank in all the love he was served and gave back as much as he could. This was something he never, ever wanted to lose, something he would protect with all his might until he no longer could.

 

But most of all, it was something he’d treasure more than anything else in the universe, for he now knew what it was like to lose something as precious as life.

 

 

| The End |