Chapter summary: Chanyeol doesn’t know how to mourn over the loss of something that is still his.

 

 

 

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“Who are you texting?”

Chanyeol sees it again; that blinding smile that was once because of him.

His husband’s smile is his second favorite thing in the world, the first one being his husband himself. Maybe it was because Chanyeol was a little more in love with him than he should be, but seeing Baekhyun smile automatically makes everything better. 

It once became his everything—his husband’s smile, that is. Sometimes, it becomes a form of salvation for Chanyeol; knowing that he would go home to Baekhyun at the end of the day and will welcome him with the smile that makes his heart pound a hundred times faster was enough for him to endure every waking day even at the lowest points of his life. 

On other days, it becomes a form of validation. Chanyeol takes pride in being one of the reasons behind Baekhyun’s bright smile and twinkling eyes. How Baekhyun manages to outshine the blinding rays of the sun is something Chanyeol never understood, but knowing that he’s one of the reasons behind it made Chanyeol swear to protect it with his life.

At one point, it became Chanyeol’s purpose in life: to make Baekhyun happy.

And he did not disappoint himself. Chanyeol thinks he is doing a really, really great job at making sure that Baekhyun never loses the smile on his face as he’s now watching it being taken away from him right in front of his eyes.

It felt like being robbed—watching something you worked so hard to take care of being easily given to someone else who probably did not do anything to deserve it feels like a losing battle you weren’t even given the chance to fight for.

Somehow, Chanyeol hates it that he’s seeing it again; that bright smile that was once for him.

Baekhyun raises his head up from his phone when he hears his husband’s voice, the light from his phone illuminating his face making it clearer for Chanyeol to see the smile he once loved so much.

“You’re done showering already?” Baekhyun answers back with an obvious question, perhaps to dodge the topic at hand. Chanyeol feels a sting in his chest. “That fast?”

Chanyeol can only give him a weak smile. “I don’t know. Spending forty five minutes in the shower doesn’t seem fast to me.”

Before his husband could answer, Chanyeol was already raising the covers to lie beside Baekhyun on the bed.

“Who are you texting?” Chanyeol repeats as he places his head on his husband’s chest, words firmer than the last.

Baekhyun puts his phone away, ignoring the way it vibrates just as it touches the nightstand, then turns to fully embrace his husband in his arms. “No one.”

When Chanyeol feels a kiss being placed on the top of his head, he knows that he’s slowly losing Baekhyun.

It didn’t feel like it was for him.

“It’s her, isn’t it?” 

The question came out as a broken whisper, but Baekhyun seems to have heard it as the hug becomes tighter like he was assuring Chanyeol that there was nothing to worry about when they both know that there is something worth fearing of—as if the tightening grip Chanyeol has on his husband’s clothes isn’t any indication that there is something wrong with their relationship.

Baekhyun pulls away to lift Chanyeol’s chin with his finger and make him meet his eyes. Suddenly, Chanyeol finds the answer he thought he has always been ready to know.

“Him.” Baekhyun corrects him as his face is inching closer to his husband’s, lips only a breath away from touching his own. The answer was far from the question; like it was supposed to be a statement of assurance, but Chanyeol doesn’t think Baekhyun knows that he knows they’re referring to the same subject.

The gap between them disappears, but somehow, it only feels as though the gap grows even wider as the kiss deepens, leaving the bridges Chanyeol has worked hard to build to reach the side beyond Baekhyun’s walls burning as Baekhyun kisses him in a way he never did before. 

(Because it wasn’t for him—the kiss wasn’t for him.)

Even Baekhyun’s kisses have found their new home.

“ His name is Park Chanyeol.”

Ah, his husband’s lies have always been divine. They manage to fool both of them to hope for another day.

Chanyeol isn’t quite sure if he would be able to cope up with the loss of a love that he doesn’t want to let go.

 

 

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Chanyeol knows it all started when Baekhyun comes home the next day with a bruise on his left cheekbone.

He remembers how he felt his heart drop the moment he set his eyes on his husband. Chanyeol quickly abandoned the paperwork on his desk and went to the latter’s side, gently guiding the limping Baekhyun to sit on the couch while he rushed to get the things needed to treat his husband’s wounds.

Baekhyun knows how to fight; between the two of them, it’s his husband who knows how to throw kicks and punches that can make anyone pass out in pain, but Baekhyun isn’t the type to start one. Baekhyun never resorted to violence even when needed and so the first time it happened, Chanyeol only guessed that the reason behind it must be something really significant.

“They were looking at Hyeran.”

And Chanyeol guessed right, the reason was significant. 

What he only didn’t know was that the reason would someday become more important than their marriage—even than Chanyeol himself.

Hyeran became the most important thing to Baekhyun; Chanyeol could only watch as he doesn’t know how to mourn over the loss of something that is still his.

“So what?” He answers back, blood boiling at the sight of his husband limping a while ago and the purple hues on his face.

Baekhyun seems to have been irked by his answer. 

“What do you mean so what ?”

“What if they were only looking at her?” Sensing the shift in the atmosphere, Chanyeol tries to calm his husband down by changing the tone of his voice. “I don’t know… maybe they thought she was pretty.”

Baekhyun averted his gaze as if he just heard something ridiculous; Chanyeol doesn’t know what he was trying so hard for. 

“I’m not stupid, Yeol.”

“Really?” Chanyeol is slowly losing hold of his temper. “Coming home with blood on your face and probably a broken bone just because people are looking at someone doesn’t sound stupid to you?”

Chanyeol knows he was overreacting; the bleeding on Baekhyun’s face was just because of the tiny cut in his upper lip, but he thinks that the bruises and the limping are enough reasons for him to feel mad.

Isn’t it normal to feel that way for a husband? 

Chanyeol couldn’t understand why it felt like he was the one at fault for just simply worrying.

“No.” Baekhyun replies through gritted teeth and really, Chanyeol doesn’t understand why his husband is trying so hard. “Besides, you would’ve done the same.”

“No,” He says it in the same way Baekhyun did. “because I wouldn’t want you to worry.”

At his husband’s lack of answer, Chanyeol realized why being so caught up with the issue angers him.

Baekhyun was busy worrying about another person while his husband was busy worrying about him.

“You were never like this, Baek. I never saw you looking like this.” Chanyeol shakes his head, jealousy and disappointment suddenly swallowing him whole and somehow, Baekhyun’s silence only manages to make it worse. “You thought about her feelings first than mine, huh?”

“Chanyeol, stop being so immature!”

He was taken aback by the answer. 

They have known each other for years, yet it was the first time Baekhyun shouted at him.

And all because of a girl that wasn’t even anything more to him than a friend—a colleague he met at work?

“Not everything is about you.” Baekhyun speaks again after that, seemingly forgetting that he was a husband first before he was a friend to his workmate. “Not everything is about our relationship. It was an emergency!”

Chanyeol feels a sting in his chest. Maybe he is really being immature this time, but he used to be Baekhyun’s top priority.

What is happening to them?

“Emergency? Oh please.” Chanyeol retorts. “Did they act on it? Did they start to catcall? Or did you just mindlessly throw yourself into a fight just because it was Hyeran?”

Chanyeol wishes so hard that he isn’t right—that everything he mentioned did happen, but then, silence was the only thing he received from Baekhyun. 

How he wished it wasn’t enough of an answer.

“You can’t even defend yourself.”

The look of confusion on Baekhyun’s face somehow feels offensive. 

“What are you trying to imply?”

Chanyeol was too hurt to answer properly. “Why? What was the first thought that came to your mind?”

Baekhyun’s silence was really deafening; the moment Chanyeol realized this was during the time he badly needed his husband to speak to chase the voices in his head away. And now, Baekhyun is doing it again.

He has no idea what to call this thing that his husband is doing to him.

As Chanyeol was about to turn and walk away, he heard his husband whisper.

“Nothing.”

The lack of confidence in Baekhyun’s voice whenever he defends himself left a scar in Chanyeol’s heart, yet at the same time, it was one of the things that kept him going despite the mess they’re slowly becoming as it was proof that Baekhyun is trying.

Pathetic, grasping onto a thin thread that has probably long snapped.

Yet Chanyeol refuses to believe that he isn’t the other end of Baekhyun’s string anymore.

“Whatever you’re thinking of,” Chanyeol says as he picks up the forgotten kit on the table, not meeting his husband’s eyes. “You are probably right.”

Chanyeol wishes this time that his husband isn’t right.

He answers his husband for the last time before walking away. 

“I’m sorry.”

How he badly wishes Baekhyun told him he was wrong instead.

“I don’t need you to be.”

Chanyeol sleeps in a different room that night despite hearing Baekhyun’s pleas on the other side of the door. His husband tells him that he shouldn’t sleep with a heavy heart. Baekhyun reminds him of the promise they made that they wouldn’t ignore each other when fighting and still sleep in the same bed even during arguments. He begs Chanyeol to come back to him.

He wanted to laugh at that; he should be the one saying that to Baekhyun because they both know what will happen if he continues his friendship with Hyeran.

Baekhyun might still be unaware of it, but he knows that his husband could feel himself straying away from Chanyeol.

Ah, that wasn’t the first time Chanyeol has acknowledged the elephant in the room, but somehow, it’s still as painful as the first time.

He chooses to escape the harsh reality he is in and spends the whole night reliving their memories in his mind, gripping a little tighter on the wedding ring in his finger as if the man wearing the other pair will feel it as well. It’s a false sense of assurance after all, seeing Baekhyun still wearing his ring—still letting people know that he’s taken.

Baekhyun enters the room a few hours after, probably assuming that his husband is already asleep, and quietly walks towards the man on the bed to place a kiss on his forehead— nothing more than an apology, Chanyeol is sure of that because that isn’t how his husband’s kisses used to feel like.

That’s not how his husband used to be like.

That night, Chanyeol ignores his husband’s request and sleeps with a heavy heart.