Lilac is such a fitting color for love, don’t you agree?

The way the color blends with two primaries to create a soft, pastel tone to signify the strength of one’s relationship. Lilac, like love, is a mix of two colors, two people, though distinct, blending to a magnificent combination.

Lilac is not purple, no, no, purple is too loud, too bright, too individual. Purple is too consuming, too selfish. Love is mutual, lilac is mutual, ergo love is lilac and lilac is love.

That’s not to say that lilac can’t consume too.

Yifan and Junmyeon used to be lilac- they used to be the most pleasant texture of red and blue, dancing on a canvas intertwined as if they were watercolors, each color frequency blending into the next, blurring the lines between two distinct individual colors until they were one. Yifan and Junmyeon were that lilac, inseparable, their lives, careers and very souls intertwined. Yifan’s rose red blend perfectly with Junmyeon’s sky blue, and, boy, was the blend a worthwhile endeavor.

More often than not, the maknae of the group would find the two curled up on Junmyeon’s bed, their bodies blending together as Kris held the blue to his red in his chest, feeling it burst with the simile that lit up the face of the younger. Sehun would smile along with his hyungs- he might be a brat towards them, but he still wanted to see them happy.

When Kris took a knee and pulled out a shining ring, Suho couldn’t take his eyes off the older male. With a yes, a burst of a gold ring made itself known in the valley of lilac, a wedding band mere weeks later, a symbol of the adoration that accelerated between the two males. The wedding itself was a quiet affair, secret save for the members of the band and select relatives from their respective families. The gold turned the lilac a sweeter color, a more candy texture that when looked at could give the beholder a toothache. The couple itself was sure to give others a toothache as well- the way their eyes shone with love and affection could melt most black canvases. The lilac lasted strong, dominating the once blank canvas.

But then too much red appeared in the lilac, unbalancing the blue, making it feel less important as the red bled across the once abundant lilac, corrupting the innocent color with its anger and distaste.

Without any witnesses, the blue began getting dimmer as Suho watched his husband detach from him, watched a cavern of soul-consuming black begin to crack between them, only enlarging, not disappearing. That black joined the red, the claws wrapping around Junmyeon’s beating heart, the grip leaving the leader breathless and caused pangs of hurt to stab into his person.

The red spread, eating up the lilac, making it cry out at the loss of blue, and the blue, the enumerated blue that loves the red, just lay there, allowing for the red to consume its very being. The blue simply lay sad as Suho stared at the blank, emotionless white of a ceiling that had borne witness to their love. As he lay emotionless, so did the dull blue. The dull blue that was the result of watching his husband’s state deteriorate as he continued on as EXO-M’s leader.

As Suho lay there with his thoughts clawing at his heart and mind, their shrill screech making scars in the fragile parts, Kris entered the room, visually miffed.

“Myeon, we have to cancel our date.”

The man in question shot up from the bed, eyes immediately on his husband, racking his frame from the top of his dark maroon hair to his pale red socks, becoming more confused once nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Junmyeon pushed off of his undone bed, messy from where he had lain, and walked to his husband, taking the massive hands into his tiny ones.

“Is something wrong?” The leader’s voice asked softly, looking up at the male that was nearly a head taller than him- which was unfair by the way, why do people get to be so tall? 188 centimeters is a little much, that height should go to others who are only like 173 centimeters by the way.

Nevertheless, Yifan shook his head and detached their hands, turning to leave the room when a hand gently touched his bicep.

“Yifan, I’m here to help you, we are married after all,” Suho paused to give the man across from him a sweet, genuine smile. “So if there’s anything wrong, you know you can tell me right?”

“Junmyeon. Just leave it alone. I’m not in the mood to talk with anyone, especially you right now. I’m aware of the fact that we’re married, I was the one that proposed after all, but you should know your limits, and this is one of them.” Kris’s voice held no room for argument, making Suho’s smile fall and his eyes shifted to the floor as he let go of his husband’s arm and pulled his own around himself, nodding as Kris left the room.

Junmyeon felt a wave of despair as he dropped to his knees, shifting so that he would sit on the floor with his arms around himself. It was his fault really, he shouldn’t have pried. Kris was a busy man, especially being the leader of EXO’s other subgroup, so it would make sense if he didn’t want to talk to anyone, even his own spouse. Suho understood his mistake, but that did not stop the hurt from hitting him at the thought of his husband not wanting to confide in him. It was okay because Junmyeon wouldn’t trust himself either.

Later, when Kris had re-entered the room, Suho was curled up in a little ball on his bed, about to fall asleep. The extremely tall male walked over to his husband, his heart clenched at the way his spouse curled in on himself whenever he slept alone. Junmyeon must have been expecting to sleep without Kris tonight, which caused the pain in his chest to double. He gently sat on the bed, running his hand through the blond hair with a gentle smile gracing his features.

Junmyeon shifted a little, curling up more into himself as if it was even possible? He tried to shake the hand going through his hair off, but Kris wouldn’t detach his hand. When the realization that the hand was not going to leave him to his rest hit him, he groggily opened his eyes, glaring at the offending arm that had woken him from his heavy sleep. He sat up once he followed the hand the rest of the way and saw that it connected to his husband’s arm.

“Fan? Is anything wrong?” Junmyeon rubbed as his sleep eyes before they widened as he rushed off the bed. “Oh god, did Chanyeol fall and hurt himself again? Where’s the first aid kit? It’s there blood?” The younger leader began to ramble as he frantically searched for the first aid kit, worried that his clumsy dongsaeng had injured himself once more. As he started for the door, his husband caught him, trying to stop him from working himself into a panic again.

“Jun, everything’s fine. No one’s injured. I just wanted to come and atone for my behavior earlier. I’m your husband, yes, but that does not allow me to act that way or say the things that I did. I’m truly sorry baby,” Kris rambled, looking down at the blond haired man whose finger he had put on a ring on. Kris could feel the red retreat for the time being from their lilac, the color being restored momentarily.

Junmyeon gave him his softest smile, making Kris’s heart melt as the eyes that held his galaxy turned to slits with the force of the smile. This man was undoubtedly the blue to his lilac, and he didn’t want that to change. Not now, not ever. Kris would fight for the honor of calling Junmyeon his husband, his missing piece, the perfect compliment to his mixed lilac.

“Stay with me? For tonight only?” Junmyeon whispered, laying his head on the broad shoulders of the man that made his blue happy. He looked up at his spouse with a look of pure devotion, confident that their love was omnifarious, no matter who they are or were in past lives. Their relationship could be sustained if they continue to communicate like they were doing now.

Unfortunately, not even communication could salvage their cracking relationship. For weeks, Suho continued to watch as the red took the blue’s space, running the color from the face of the canvas until only red remained. He watched as his husband detached himself completely from their bed, from their lilac love, from their passionate adoration. He watched as the red that had blended with his blue no longer did, leaving him gloomy, like the blue on an unforgiving winter day, consuming his being, allowing the snow to plague his very being and chill his heart to the core.

Kris watched as his red claimed victory with the blue, watched as his husband smiled at him with his red, blood red stained eyes, with his broken smile, with strangled emotions. Yifan’s red remained steadfast as he held his husband, the most precious person to him, in his chest, his heart beginning to bleed red at the thought of leaving him behind.

Yifan wanted to bring their lilac back, he wanted to watch the red on Junmyeon’s lips stretch into a smile directed at him and him alone, but he had no right when his own red was the reason that the lilac was gone.

“I want to stay together,” Yifan whispered into the younger’s hair, holding back his tears as the other only burrowed into his chest further, for once not complaining about the wide shoulders or the too broad chest. Junmyeon took what affection he could have from Kris at this point, feeling a goodbye coming that he would never be prepared for.

“Yifan-“ Suho began but never finished, a choked sob halting him from doing so. The said male-only pulled him closer into his chest cavity, their canvas of love painted red with the blood of their throbbing, hurting hearts as Junmyeon continued to cry, Yifan shedding a few drops as well. Their hearts bled from the shards of the situation, pulling them apart, gushing onto the once lilac canvas once more, bright red consuming the purple completely.

“Our love story doesn’t end here, Myeon,” Kris whispered, beginning to rock his crying spouse, trying to stop the deterioration of lilac into the red. EXO-K’s leader looked at his soon to be former co-leader, not caring about the tears tracking down his soft face. He gave his husband a watery half-smile, proud of his attempt to keep the relationship together even at what was supposed to be its failing point.

“Kris, if you leave, then SM will force us to get a divorce, we both know they’d do it,” Suho explained, looking into the taller’s chest as he picked at the white shirt that covered his husband’s torso. He felt the chest rise and fall as his husband sighed.

“I know.”

“Yifan I love you so much.”

“I love you too babe.”

Junmyeon choked as he watched his husband’s hand trail down to the one that his wedding ring occupied, pulling the slender hand to his lips. Kris remembered the multiple nights where the two leaders would lie together and that very hand would rest on his chest, either in solitude when they actually drifted off to sleep or drawing little patterns and rubbing up and down the expanse of it when Junmyeon was trying to calm him down.

The ring in front of them was their lilac, and it would soon be gone too.

Even as hard as the two fought with their very souls, the red dried up, leaving only a small amount of blue to occupy the canvas, the sky blue alone once more on the vast white area that was once his spouse.

Junmyeon felt himself begin to fall apart once his husband had left, divorce talks in the works but never completed. They had come to an agreement to take their wedding bands off so that they would appear divorced. The general public and their respective managers would believe that, but Junmyeon couldn’t bring himself to do so. He could not accept the fact that his blue only remained on the canvas. The ring was his declaration of love, his proof that his husband had his still beating heart, broken, battered and bleeding, in his hands. He could not take it off, for if he did, it would be saying that he did not love his husband anymore, and he very much did.

On his end, Kris could not allow his ex-manager to take his wedding ring. It was the only thing he had left of EXO. The only thing he had left of his husband’s cheery face, of the galaxies that inhabited his very eyes, of the toothy smile that lit up his every morning. It was the only the only connection he had to Junmyeon and he would fight to keep it even if it meant he would never see his husband again.

Instead of handing over his ring, Junmyeon showed his management the divorce papers he has signed and supposedly mailed to Kris for a quiet and secret divorce. Somehow, the leader persuaded them to let them keep his ring on, but in order to do so, he had to convince his fans that it was nothing but a random ring and not a sign of his love.

Kris, on the other hand, keeps his ring on a chain around his neck, close to his heart, where the other person with the exact same ring still held a strong spot there, a home even.

Kris sighed, unlocking his phone to see Suho’s smiling face, probably the only thing he could use to remember his husband seeing as Yifan was mid-lawsuit with his husband’s company.

A small smile graced his face before he locked his phone, setting it on the lilac sheets of the hotel bed he was on. With a tremble, he brought his left hand to his face, tracing his lips, trying to remember his last kiss with his beloved.

“I promise you our love story doesn’t end here Junmyeon. I swear to you, my heart.”

He could almost hear Suho’s soft voice replying, “You better, Wu Yifan.”

Yifan smiled, kissing his wedding ring before turning on his side and attempting to fall asleep with his husband’s smiling face on his mind.

When Suho woke up in the morning to Sehun showering, he mourned the empty sheets next to him that did not hold his husband. His wonderful, sometimes dense husband who he had gotten used to waking up by. Sadly, Kris was long gone, a mere quiet goodbye was all Suho had gotten out of him the day he left.

A soft smile stretched lightly across his face at the thought of Kris, but his heart ached at the thought of his wayward husband walking out the door, out of Suho’s life.

Pangs of a familiar scarlet hurt raced through his chest as he watched Sehun walk into their joint room, dressed for the day. Sehun probably had no idea about the inner hurt of his hyung, no idea about Suho’s blue that yearned for Yifan red, about the still bleeding heart in Junmyeon’s chest cavity. The poor young man had though his hyung was okay, that his hyung has so much strength that he had gotten over the loss of his husband so quickly. But even the maknae has been known to be wrong.

Suho gave the younger male an artificial smile, withholding all negative emotions from Sehun. He didn’t need to know his hyung’s struggles.

As Sehun left the room with one last smile towards him, Junmyeon let his left hand slip off the side of the bed, the wedding ring on his fourth finger glittering in the sunlight. He missed Kris, but maybe Kris hadn’t missed him because their wedding anniversary was two months ago and the elder male had maintained no contact.

“Happy Anniversary, Yifan.” He whispered, a nasty feeling of disappointment rising within his rapidly chilling core.

“Happy Anniversary, Junmyeon.” Yifan murmured back, miles away in a hotel in Hong Kong, where he had begun his search for a new label to sign onto. He looked down at his ring, guilt rising in his chest as he thought of his husband, whom he had not contacted in more than a year.

His blue, his wonderful, bright blue that lit up his life more than the color yellow could. His bright, bubbling blue husband who probably had begun to think lowly of him, no contact for more than a year. He even missed their wedding anniversary because of this lawsuit that he was filing against the company that had mistreated him so many times.

Kris wanted to make it up to Junmyeon, to sweep the younger male into his arms and spin him around until the wonderful sound of joyous laughter filled his ears and his heart. He wanted to see Suho’s plush lips stretched into a smile, a genuine smile that would light up any room he walked into. He wanted to squeeze those dainty hips in a hug and never, ever let go of the younger again, but alas, he could not. He could no longer watch the sky blue smirk, or scold his dongsaengs. He could no longer hold the blue to his chest, no longer promise the safety of their lilac.

Kris’s red was no longer paint, it was a wave, a massive wave of red that bled into every alcove of the canvas and brought nothing but destruction. His red was the coffee spill on white clothing, the mark of sharpie on a previously markless wall. The red, the horrible, out of control red that had a fervent belief in destroying all other combinations.

Wu Yifan knew he could not control his red, his anger at the situation, but no matter how much the long gone lilac implored for him to do so, he could not.

He supposed this was the beginning of his deteriorating marriage.

“Hyung?” A soft voice echoed through the silence, emotionally lacking. Kris turned his head, that voice being all too familiar; it was impossible that the body belonging to that voice was here. Suho should have been in Korea, with the rest of the members, powering on like the guardian he was, unaffected by the tides of the world.

“Wu Yifan, you better have a good excuse for not speaking to your own husband for two years,” Junmyeon’s voice held a sense of warning as he spoke, but the waver in his voice could not be disguised as a sense of joy filled him at the sight of the taller male.

Kris simply stated to laugh, picking up the smaller male and swung him around.

“Baby, I couldn’t have asked for anything better for Christmas,” Kris laughed as he brought Junmyeon into his rapidly beating heart. A sense of completeness overcame as he finally faced the reality he was placed in. All those bitter, black, angry nights that ate at his soul, running through his body and leaving him with an unsavory sense of chill, of emptiness.

He could smell the cherry blossom scent of Suho’s shampoo- a new yet dreadful sensation, how much of this man’s life had Kris missed?