"You look like ," Chanyeol says, worry lacing his voice. He shuts his laptop to fully face Baekhyun, who is curled up in his couch and staring, rather intently, at the succulent plant on his coffee table.

It's been three days since he's seen Kai. He misses having Froot Loops for breakfast, it suddenly strikes Baekhyun that he has no memory of actually ever buying cereals. In that moment he realises it's Kai who has always been stocking the shelves with them, and the worst part is Kai doesn't even eat it, something to do with the amount of sugar it contains. Baekhyun groans into the pillow, he can't stop thinking about him.

In graphic design, there's something called as widow. They were told in their first class to avoid it as much as possible. A widow is a single word that occupies a new line at the end of a paragraph. It creates a visual interruption, his professor said. That's exactly what Baekhyun feels like, a lonely word that dangles awkwardly at the bottom of the paragraph, close enough, but still not belonging to it.

Chanyeol jabs his shoulder with his finger, "You've gotta cough it up at some point. You're going to burst otherwise,"

Baekhyun still hasn't told Chanyeol about it, all he's done is sulk and steal his clothes. Baekhyun forcefully raises himself up and sighs, "I'm so stupid," he says.

"Noted and agreed. Go ahead,"

Baekhyun ignores him and continues, "Do you know Kyungsoo? Kai's friend, who is supposedly joining our uni,"

Chanyeol knits his eyebrows, not understanding the relevancy of the question, "I guess I remember Sehun mentioning him a few times, yeah,"

"Kai has a thing for him or whatever and he asked me if he could practice his kissing with me,"

"Oh no no," Chanyeol mutters softly, but it's loud enough for Baekhyun to catch it.

"I agreed, because, I mean, why not? No harm right? Now, we are in a friends with benefits kinda," Baekhyun pauses, they never addressed the friends with benefits thing either, they never talked about it. Because there was nothing, correction, they were nothing. Chanyeol pats him on his knees, noticing Baekhyun struggling to complete.

"I guess, I guess I was wrong in thinking it wouldn't matter? So foolish of me, really, it's Kai we're talking about, so I obviously fell for him. And for a miniscule second there I thought something shifted, and he felt the same way too. But Kyungsoo arrived, you know, on New Year's and my entire little make-believe bubble burst, now I don't know what to do," Baekhyun buries his face in his hands, "Why is this so hard," he mumbles.

Chanyeol finally says, "You know Sehun was the one who told me there's something definitely going on between the two of you. That's when I began to pick it up too, and I don't know if I should tell this to you but Sehun told me Kai doesn't talk about Kyungsoo anymore, from what I gathered he wouldn't stop eating his ear off about him earlier. So, maybe-,"

Baekhyun interrupts him, he is tired of building castles in the air. "No," Baekhyun mumbles, lifting his head up.

Chanyeol waves his hands exasperatedly, "Have you at least tried talking to him?"

"I tried to,"

Chanyeol raises his eyebrows, "And?"

"I said I tried to, I didn't say I did,"

Chanyeol sighs, he takes Baekhyun's hand into his, "He has gotta be the stupidest person on this planet if he doesn't like you," he says, eyes swimming with affection. Baekhyun feels lighter after talking, an imaginary burden lifting itself off of his shoulders. Baekhyun sends a small smile in his direction, "Thanks,"

Chanyeol jumps to his feet, "You know what, it's been a long time since we've not gone out. And there's a new club, Jekyll, it's only a couple blocks away, you've been cooped up in here for too long,"

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