Baekhyun is standing near the traffic lights. Impatiently, he taps his foot on the ground waiting for the colour to turn green.

Just looking at the long stretch of road to the other side makes him feel annoyed. He is already late. He always is. And he knows he will be told off about this.

He glances down at his watch, and the sunlight catches of the edges of the dial and dances off playfully. His eyes follow the bouncing sun rays off the watch and looks up - directly into the eyes of a man staring intently at him. A vehicle passes between them and Baekhyun blinks, his mind shaking off that momentary meeting of the eyes. But when the vehicle is gone the eyes are still staring at him. The intensity of the gaze makes Baekhyun feel strangely hot under the collar. Right in the middle of a freezing winter.

His eyes search the other person’s face, a blank mask with lush lips and smooth skin. Feeling awkward Baekhyun looks away, his eyes flitting this way and that. But inexorably, he is drawn back to the man staring at him. He can’t seem to look away. 

Someone bumps into him pushing him forward and he realizes that the light has turned green and the people have started crossing the road. The man across the road gives a start, as if he hadn’t realise either and after a few confused blinks, steps somewhat uncertainly into the bustling throng. But his eyes never leave Baekhyun’s.

Something about him is so familiar, so tied to some feeling he can’t quite remember. Baekhyun feels a blush rising on his cheek as his mind whirls and he is pushed along with the crowd closer and closer to the man. 

The feeling reminds him of something long forgotten. Laying on a bunk bed with his sweaty palms, his cheeks flushed, his body uncomfortably warm, listening to the gentle sleeping sounds of his roommate and the creaking of the bed as he twists and turns. It feels a little like staring into the big eyes of his roommate behind his square rimmed glasses, a little like seeing his heart shaped smile across a crowded cafeteria, a little like the burn in his body when his roommate laid a hand on his back, on his thigh, on his shoulder as he spoke to him. 

He thinks of the exhilaration he felt every time his roommate walked into the room with some snack or other.

He thinks of the gut wrenching fear he feels about his twisted emotions. The should I’s and the shouldn’t I’s. 

And he thinks about the heartbreak he feels when his roommate has to leave their private boarding school in England to go back to his parents in Korea. 

He thinks of all of this and he can see it. He can see it all play across the eyes of the man walking closer and closer towards him. 

And he understands, after 10 years, that maybe… just maybe his roommate felt it all too. That his smiles meant something, that when he laid his hands on Baekhyun’s bare thigh he felt his heart race too, that when he twisted and turned in his bed at night maybe it was because he couldn’t sleep either, weighed down as much as Baekhyun with their churning emotions. 

The man comes so close that Baekhyun could see the 5 O’ clock stubble on his soft cheeks and then, in an instance, he passes Baekhun by. His face is tilted sideways as if to catch a last glimpse of Baekhyun’s face. And Baekhyun thinks, accompanied by an inexplicable pain in his gut, he still smells the same. 

His eyes well up before he knows it and he gasps in a quite breath. 

The moment passes.

He passes.

And Baekhyun is borne away with the bustling crowd steadily to the other side of the street. When Baekhyun steps on the curb, feeling suddenly exhausted, he is greeted by the shrill voice of his wife, saying a curt ‘You are late!’. 

He says nothing as he tries to catch his breath and she, as always, never even notices. Her mind might already be on the 50% off sale at the department store or the dinner party she was hosting to show off their new house to their friends. Baekhyun doesn’t know and, as she turns and starts walking towards the mall, he doesn’t care. His legs follow her reluctantly, almost out of habit, but his heart aches and his head turns unable to stop himself. 

His eyes search the crowd on the opposite side of the street for those eyes, desperately, and he fears that he missed him. But he is still there, still watching him, standing exactly where Baekhyun had stood before. 

Baekhyun’s thoughts race and he starts to mouth something.

But what, what could he possibly say. What could he possibly say that will ever be as meaningful as the gentle way his roommate had wiped egg yolk off his hair after he had been bullied as the new kid. What could possibly be as meaningful as the day when his roommate had to leave and Baekhyun, full of aching regret for what he could never express and now will never be able to, cried and cried, while his roommate looked on helplessly. 

Baekhyun pauses and in that second the man’s eyes move away from his face for the first time since their eyes met. Baekhyun follows his eyes, to his wife who is now tugging at his arm and muttering angrily. He looks at her uncomprehendingly. Because the axis of his world has tilted and her world with her new shopping list and dinner parties are a million miles away, twice removed. His eyes move back to the man who seemed to be staring at his wife with dawning comprehension. And Baekhyun knows with horror that he knows. He knows who this woman is. 

The man blinks and looks at Baekhyun for what seems like an entirely too short second. 

Tears blurr Baekhyun’s vision and he squeezes his eyes shut to expel some of the weight that is stuck inside him. 

His world disappears for a moment and when it comes back to focus, the man is gone. 

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*I don' t know who will even read this but if someone does - I might add on something later to stop this from being so angsty - EveningSky (JeonyeokHaneul)