Tangerine Dream

止まること　泣くこと　                         
そんなの いつでも　出来るね                    

Stopping and crying

Such things can be done at any time

Dinner is a solemn but pleasant affair. The din of his grandmother’s favorite variety show, punctuated by occasional laughter from him and his grandmother, provides just the kind of noise that Chanyeol needed to detach himself from reality for a while.

The table was bursting with plates upon plates of Chanyeol’s favorite side dishes. It was classic grandma behavior, Chanyeol thought as he sighed in fond exasperation. Was his grandmother expecting twenty other people to eat with them?

Heechul couldn’t even stay for dinner, much to their dismay. He had to go back to Seoul immediately, as Sehun needed someone with him the next day for a photoshoot.  

Chanyeol could not find it in himself to feel bitter about that. In the midst of this stormy time, at least Sehun should survive. It reassured Chanyeol, knowing that even if SC were to disband, Sehun would still have something going for himself.

 He should probably send the brat a text tonight, to wish him luck.

“Come help me wash the dishes,” his grandmother tells him once they’ve both finished eating.

Chanyeol follows obediently.

He helps her put the leftover food into containers, organizing them inside the fridge to eat in the following days. It takes longer than her expected, what with the large amount of food his grandmother made.

“Halmeoni, why did you cook so much?” he complains as he surveys the stacks of food containers. “It’ll take days to finish all of this.”

“It’s been three years since my only grandson came to visit,” his grandmother answers from her place at the sink. “Can’t this old lady splurge a little?” Her tone is half teasing, half admonishing.

Chanyeol scratches the back of his neck in embarrassment as he goes to stand beside her by the sink. He snatches the dishtowel from its hook and starts drying the small stack that his grandmother had finished rinsing.

“I didn’t mean to not visit,” he says apologetically. “It’s just been really busy…”

“You city folks are always busy,” she states, unimpressed. “It’s always work, work, work. You earn lots of money, but what then? You get sick and all that money goes to waste anyway…”

Chanyeol smiles despite himself. Halmeoni was like a mother hen at times, endlessly clucking about the world. Her incessant talking never failed to amuse Chanyeol—something about her tone, maybe? Her tone was always sharp, but the words never actually pricked. Everything she said was said out of care, poorly disguised as a scolding.

“But halmeoni, I got you that nice tv, didn’t I? It’s thanks to my city folk job that you get to watch Jo Insung so clearly,” Chanyeol teases.

“Eeguh, you naughty boy.” A pinch at his side, and Chanyeol yelps. “Did you at least get me his autograph?”

“It’s not that easy,” the singer whines. “Even in the celebrity world, there are hierarchies, you know? Sunbaenim is a god, I can’t just approach him so easily.”

“I even bragged to all the grandmothers yesterday,” the old lady laments. “What’s the use of a famous 4grandson when he can’t even get autographs for his grandmother?’

Chanyeol can only laugh at his grandmother’s antics, promising afterwards that he will put his ego at stake and beg for Jo Insung’s autograph if he had to.

The conversation lulls, and for a while there is only the sound of the plates clinking in the sink, the water gushing out from the faucet.

“Don’t apologize.”

Chanyeol blinks.

“Don’t apologize,” his grandmother repeats. “Not when you did not do anything wrong. Apologize for the bother you are causing, if you have to. But not for what they accuse you of, do you hear me? Never.”

Chanyeol can only nod.

“People will always be fickle. Today they love you, tomorrow they’ll throw stones at you. Don’t let the words of those faceless people get to you, understand?”

She hands him the last plate, and he wipes it dry. Inside, his chest feels like a storm. His nose itches, his eyes water but he refuses to cry. He bites at his lip and forces himself to hum in agreement.

He hangs the dishtowel back at its hook and moves to walk out of the kitchen, muttering an excuse of going to bed.

“Chanyeol-ah.”

Chanyeol pauses at the doorway. “Yes, halmeoni.”

“I’m proud of you for protecting your sister.”

He can feel the smile in her voice, and he loses the battle. He staggers out of the kitchen and into his room, carefully closing the door so his grandmother wouldn’t hear. He sits with his back on the door, his face buried between his knees as he finally lets himself cry.

Today marked the year after.

Junmyeon tried not to acknowledge it, tried to make his mind dismiss it. But what his mind could forget, his soul could not. And he feels his chest constrict in grief as soon as he opens his eyes that morning.

He changes out of his clothes, puts away his futon. Wipes the floor. Fetches his water and washes up. His body is running purely on instinct, on habit formed by hundreds of days of unchanging routine. But every single action feels more of a chore, a heavy burden that he’d rather not take up. He wants to go back to bed, to curl up in the darkness of his room as he wills the day away. But he’d promised Baekhyun. He’d promised he’ll keep going. He’d promised.

He sits by himself yet again at the table way too large for one, his plate of miserable rice balls the only thing to take up space in the empty expanse.

He regards the plate with ire, and a  flash of crossness overtakes him. He snatches the plate and flings it to the wall in frustration.

He revels at the loud sound that it makes, slashing at the oppressive quiet. But it is gone as soon as it came, and Junmyeon is suffocating again. His mind clears, and he kneels before the mess of scattered rice and broken plate.

He gasps in horror at the sight, eyes instantly welling up as he picks up a broken piece. This had been one of Baekhyun’s favorite plates! How could he have been so careless? Baekhyun had been so proud of acquiring this. He would be so mad if he found out Junmyeon—

“I’m sorry,” Junmyeon sobs to nobody. “’I’m sorry, Hyun-ah. I didn’t mean to, I really didn’t…”

He knows Baekhyun could not hear. For there was no Baekhyun anymore. There hasn’t been one, for a year now.

Junmyeon takes the broken piece with him, hugging it to his chest as he staggers out of the house. He runs, his feet clumsily taking one step after another towards the only thing left of his family. The meadow comes into view, with its surrounding trees and the pond nearby.

The fox spirit lets himself fall to his knees, the grass cushioning his fall. His eyes fall on the white flowers surrounding him. He picks one, careful not to hurt the delicate flower too much as he curls up on himself, hugging the flower to his chest along with his broken plate.

Humans had the belief that fox rains took place because of fox weddings. It was slightly correct, but it was not exactly so. Fox spirits were magical creatures, deeply connected with nature. As such, any slight intention on their part could influence the things around them—in this case the weather.

It was not something conscious on their part, but somehow, when fox spirits felt a surge of emotions, the sky would feel with them. It would make its sun shine bright, but would make its clouds shyly shower rain at the same time. It was a peculiar thing, and was of no use whatsoever. But happen it did.

The most frequent occasion for fox rain was due to fox weddings: the love from the married couple added with the delight of the jubilant attendees, fox weddings were a bubbling cauldron of emotions that made for fox rains that lasted for hours.

But for the lone boy at the meadow, there was only anguish. There was only longing and sadness and overwhelming misery as he cried his heart out for the people he could no longer reach

The sky does not discriminate.

A fox spirit’s heart was bursting, and so the sky warmed its sun and gathered its clouds.

A fox rain tries to warm and soothe at the same time, like a warm hand with a damp cloth for the fever of emotions.

But a fox rain is not a hug, not a slew of comforting words, and definitely not the family that the boy so desperately wants back.

The morning had been sunny. The sky had been so clear, not a hint of rainy weather anywhere. So why the sudden downpour?

It wasn’t even rain rain. It was somewhere between rain and a light shower, small raindrops taking their time as they danced down to the earth. Not big nor strong enough to completely drench, and yet drizzly enough to make everything considerably damp.

The sun kept shining, as if battling the rain. No, wait. It didn’t feel like a battle, Chanyeol thought. It was more like the sun was allowing the rain some spotlight, weakening its warm rays and dimming its light in order to make way for the shy drizzle. Chanyeol gapes at the fading rainbow in the sky soon as he steps out of his grandmother’s house. Haphazardly pulling on a hooded sweater, he regrets not bringing his phone with him to take a picture of the rare sight. He regards the drizzle with a wary eye, and hopes the hood will be enough—he didn’t feel like bringing an umbrella for his walk.

He doesn’t even know why he is going on a walk. He was generally opposed to venturing out of his grandmother’s house—which, though lacking an internet connection and only had a dozen channels on the tv, was the most familiar and comfortable place for him in this quaint little town. He didn’t like the nosy neighbors, the gawking townspeople who liked to stare at his golden white hair. They thought him to be the stereotypical city boy, rebellious and haughty and scandalous. Not all of them were like that, of course. His grandmother, for one, had taken one look at his hair and then chuckled softly. “I bet your mother had a small heart attack from this one,” she had said teasingly while reaching up to ruffle the blond locks with her endearingly wrinkled hand.

And then there was that kid he had met while buying groceries. He had looked up at Chanyeol’s tall figure, gasping adorably as his eyes fell upon Chanyeol’s hair. “Oppa is your hair magic?” she’d asked. Chanyeol may or may not have said that it was.

All in all, Chanyeol did not like going out. But today. Today was an exception. He had taken one glance from his window at the light shower outside, and his heart ached for some reason. For a moment it felt like his heart was too big for his chest, each beat slamming through him painfully. And then, just as suddenly as it came, the ache went away.

Dazed, he had stood up from his desk, putting down his phone and ambling out of his room and out of the house.

With no particular destination in mind, he stood at the porch and tried to remember the ache he had felt. It had wanted him to go somewhere. But where…?

The forest, he soon decides.

He stepped off the porch and strolled to the back of his grandmother’s house, where a small path leading to the dense woodland was. He had never taken this path before, had never been interested in it no matter how many times his grandmother had encouraged him to take a walk down through the forest. Which was why Chanyeol was confused as his feet seemed to make decisions for him, leading him through the thicket like he had been there several times before.

The forest wasn’t as dense as it had seemed. The trees were mostly tall and thin, with their leaves making a roof that was not quite thick enough to provide shelter from the soft rain. Nevertheless, they deflected the rain enough for Chanyeol to take off his hood.

He kept walking, admiring the scenes before him from time to time. The sunlight peeking from between the leaves, along with the thin layer of water that blanketed everything made him feel like he was in the middle of something ethereal.

Still being prodded by whatever weird energy his feet seem to have today, Chanyeol steps out of the path, walking aimlessly between the trees and bushes. He vaguely wonders where all his city senses had gone. He was supposed to be more careful than this. It could be dangerous. But he doesn’t stop walking. He couldn’t. He had to find it. But what was it?

He soon hears the sound of water flowing. His heart jumps at the sound, and he tries to catch his breath at the sudden excitement as he followed the sound with a brisk pace. The line of trees come to an abrupt stop as he came upon a clearing. Glancing around, he realizes that it had been the sound of a waterfall he was hearing.

It was nothing grand, only a few feet tall. The clear water swished over the rocks at the top and fell down gently to the rocks below with a giggling sound. The water flowed out into a lake—no, it was more of a pond. The fresh smell of earth and damp grass filled Chanyeol’s nostrils as he stepped closer to the pond, reminding him of childhood summers long gone by. The pond was mostly still. Its water was clear, and the light trickling from the heavens gave it a silvery tint. Below the water’s surface, he could see small fishes swim from rock to rock, some of them racing past each other as if playing a game. He was about to kneel beside the bank to reach his hand in, planning to tease the fishes a little bit, when a figure to his right catches his eye.

He slowly turns his head and sees a boy sitting on the grass a few steps away. The boy looked as otherworldly as everything in the place, with his porcelain-like skin and strange clothing. He was dressed in robes of some kind, his hand barely peeking out from the wide sapphire sleeve. It reminds Chanyeol of some Japanese shows he had watched as a child.

He almost smirks at the boy’s hair—it was a mix of white and blue that reminded him both of the sky and the clouds at the same time. The soft and lush tresses of pale turquoise were mesmerizing, and Chanyeol wonders where the boy had gotten his dye job. Was the boy from the city as well, forced to spend his summer vacation with his grandparents? He certainly looked like he was Chanyeol’s age. But Chanyeol quickly dismisses the thought. No city boy would dress up like this. Not outside of a cosplay.

The boy’s robes looked elegant but comfortable. The leaf designs on the ts are blurry, however, an evidence of having been worn down by time. The boy must like those robes, Chanyeol thinks, if he’s worn them so much like that.

A movement from behind the boy catches Chanyeol’s eye. There are white…things…behind the boy. Was it a bush of some kind? It was white, shaped like a flame, the very top a delicate beryl—much like the boy’s hair.

The bush twitches and Chanyeol stifles a yelp.

Were those…

Tails?

He follows the shapes to their base, where they stopped right above the boy’s backside.

Yessir, definitely tails. Three of them, too. Chanyeol gulps and considers hightailing it out of the forest right then. Now looking closely, he could see a pair of not-so-human ears atop the boy’s head. They were the wrong shape for a cat’s. A dog, maybe? But the tails didn’t look like a dog’s. The bushiness of it reminded Chanyeol of Nick Wilde.

He mentally slaps himself. It was a good thing no one was around, and that nobody could hear his thoughts about Zootopia. It’s not like it was a crime, liking an animated film that much. But the fact that he watches it at least once a month (and on particularly bad days) was something that the singer would rather keep to himself.

Back to boy, though… tales of the gumiho goes through Chanyeol’s mind. That was what he was, right? A fox spirit. What was he supposed to do about it, though? The situation escalated from innocent trekking to a horror movie in an instant. Did the fox spirit lure him into the forest? Was it going to kill him? Was it going to eat his liver?

He keeps his eye on the creature as he raises a foot to take a step back. That was probably a mistake.

The boy’s hands are at his sides, holding on to the edge as his legs swung freely in and out of the water below. They swung alternately like clockwork, each kick launching a thin arc of water that splash back into the pond. The movement of his feet was cheery…and yet, for some reason, the sight pulls at Chanyeol’s heart. His foot freezes in midair, now unwilling to walk away.

This wasn’t… this wasn’t the action of someone looking to kill. Nothing about the boy betrayed malice of any kind. He was just…there. Playing with the water by himself. And somehow Chanyeol did not like that, did not like the way the small figure hunched in on himself.

He purses his lips with conviction and slowly makes his way towards the boy. He stops a few steps from the stranger, careful not to astonish him too much.

“Hello,” he softly greets.

The boy’s legs stop swinging as he turns his head and looks up at Chanyeol. If he was surprised, he hid it well. It is Chanyeol who breathes out a sharp gasp as he sees the stranger’s face for the first time. He had looked pretty from the side, but here, in full view… he was captivating. His long turquoise hair covered his forehead and stopped just above his deep set, golden brown eyes.

Chanyeol’s breath catches as he looks closer and sees that the boy’s eyes had a slight tinge of crimson. He had been crying. As if to confirm Chanyeol’s suspicion, a lone tear escapes the boy’s eye and trails slowly down his cheek. Chanyeol’s gaze falls on the boy’s small pink lips as the latter hesitantly greets back.

“Hello.” There is a betraying crack in his voice, but it is a soft sound that sends a wave of warmth through Chanyeol. This was strange. Everything about this was strange—the rain, the walk, the forest, the pond, the boy. And yet...it felt right.

“May I…May I sit beside you?” the blond asks hesitantly.

The boy blinks at him for a moment, perhaps finding the situation as odd as Chanyeol did. He looks at Chanyeol with wide unblinking eyes, as if he expected him to disappear any second. But he soon gives a small smile and nods.

The action petrifies Chanyeol, making him feel as if his limbs are made of wood as he clumsily staggered forward. He makes sure to leave enough space between him and the boy before he takes off his shoes and socks, placing them at his side as he sits down. He lowers his feet to the water, and a slight shiver travels up his body as his toes touched the cool surface.

“It’s icy at first but after some time it will feel refreshing.” The blond almost jumps at the voice. He had momentarily forgotten about his companion. The boy spoke so softly, almost guardedly. Like he was afraid of breaking something.

Chanyeol nods and lets his feet sink below the water’s surface. The cold startles him, but just as the boy said, it soon becomes a welcome coolness against the sultry air.

Chanyeol turns to the boy. “’It feels nice,“ he confirms, beaming. The boy smiles in evident relief and resumes swinging his legs on the water. Chanyeol copies him, and they bask in the comfortable silence as they make ripples upon ripples on the pond’s surface. It was a pointless, almost juvenile act. But it was calming.

“My name is Chanyeol,” the blond says after some time. He does not look at the boy, choosing instead to fix his eyes on his feet.

“I’m Junmyeon.” The singer smiles to himself as he hears the reply, bracing himself before he spares the boy another glance.

And it was right then, at that moment, that the dull pain in Chanyeol’s chest stopped. And the tension on his shoulders disappeared, fading away along with the accumulated stress of his young adult life.

It was then that everything felt alright. The boy and the fox spirit were far from happy, but they could feel the promise of it—  that moment, sitting by the pond beside each other as the gentle fox rain fell gently around them, weakening into an almost nonexistent shower until it was no more.