Kyuhyun 

“Are you okay Kyu?” Jessica asked, walking up behind him at work Friday morning.

Kyuhyun had spent the last hour and a half restocking shelves while quietly (and unconsciously) humming. Not to mention, grinning like an idiot. Even another monotonous day of placing book after book on shelf after shelf didn’t seem to be able to dent his good mood. Knowing that Siwon was coming over that night both terrified and thrilled him, though he had to admit that he was mostly thrilled. It wasn’t like him, and Jessica was actually a little worried.

When she tapped his shoulder and asked if he was alright he suddenly realized the pleasant music in his head had been spilling out of his mouth. His eyes widened, his smile dropped and he turned bright red before jolting around to face her.

“I’m fine” he spit out still trying to avoid her gaze.

“You were… um, humming.” She stated rather matter-of-factly.

She had one eyebrow raises and a look of concern was spread over her face. He coughed and put another book on the shelf.

“No I wasn’t” he retorted.

“Okay Kyu, I know you think I’m stupid, but I’m not deaf. If you’re alright though then please, continue.” she said with a scoff. “It’s just not like you to be smiling and humming and all… what’s gotten into you?”

He turned around a bit speechless and blinked a few times before replying. He figured it was probably best that he didn’t tell her how excited she was. He wasn’t a teenage school-girl…. Though truthfully, he felt as giddy as one.

“Um nothing… I’m just having a good day I guess.”

She smiled and shook her head, playfully ruffling his hair.

“Get back to work” she responded to the annoyed expression on his face. “And keep humming if you feel like it” she added with a laugh. “Oh, and I can’t wait for the barbeque tonight. I’m super excited! When Ara told me that you-”

“Yeah, whatever” Kyuhyun said rudely, turning away before she could finish her sentence.

She just shook her head again and walked away smiling. She had known him long enough to not be offended; annoyed, but not offended.

A few hours later when Jessica let him go on break, he realized he was humming again. One look at the expression on her face was enough to make him stop (and blush again in embarrassment). Kyuhyun’s phone started to ring and he pulled it out and grinned when he saw Ara’s picture on the screen.

“Hey Ara!” he answered happily

“Hey Kyu-Kyu, it’s me! When I was out shopping for supplies for the party tonight I forgot to pick up drinks, and all we have at home is water and some bad milk. Since you’re still at the library could you stop by the store and grab something for tonight?”

“Araaaa” he groaned, not because of the request, but because of the greeting.

She understood and laughed on the other line.“Sorry, I won’t call you Kyu-Kyu… my widdlebabybwother” she joked.

“What should I get?” he asked shaking his head with a grin.

“Anything you feel like. Oh and some milk too.”

“Okay okay” he said faking irritation.

 He almost hung up, but she started talking againafter a few seconds, well, not really talking… Ara blurted out, “Oh right, and I told Siwon that you would pick him up at 6:00, love you!” and hung up the phone before Kyuhyun could do so much as choke on his lunch… Which he did promptly after the phone went dead.

“Ara? Ara, are you serious!?” He coughed out and tried to call her again when he noticed she had hung up.

She didn’t answer, not that he really expected her to. You’ve got to be kidding me, he thought as he pushed the rest of his forgotten lunch to the side. He softly banged his head on the edge of the table until he felt a soft hand on his shoulder. He looked up annoyed to see Jessica hovering above him and just shook his head and groaned, banging his head back on the table when she started to ask why his mood had changed so suddenly.

Terror had effectively replaced the excitement that he was feeling and groaning had replaced the humming.

***

“Thanks a lot Ara” he muttered to himself as he left work to pick up drinks. “You just had to tell him that I would come get him. Couldn’t you just pick him up yourself? Won’t even answer my phone calls. God this . Maybe this is a bad idea… Maybe we should just call the whole thing off.” He trailed off when he noticed the cashier staring at him as if he had suddenly grown an extra head.

“What?” he barked angrily; needless to say the cashier stopped staring.

It was already 5:30 and Kyuhyun was outside of Siwon’s place. He had been sitting on a bench under a large oak tree for an hour, rocking back and forth just trying to stay calm. He finally got the nerve up to walk to the door twenty minutes later. He knocked a few times and stood, waiting anxiously for Siwon. When the older boy didn’t answer, Kyuhyun started to get nervous. He paced back and forth for a bit before trying again, and he finally decided to call after knocking for a third time. He got even more nervous when the phone rang a few times with no answer, though he did pick up eventually.

“Hello?” Siwon sounded fairly annoyed and Kyuhyun was suddenly overwhelmed with a wave of nausea.

“Um, it’s Kyuhyun, I’m here. I knocked… are you home?” he asked tentatively.

“Huh? What? Oh” the older boy responded, sounding a bit confused. “Um, just a second”

Kyuhyun was relieved at the sudden shift in Siwon’s voice and he started to relax, until he heard the door open and saw the older boy standing in front of him in all his ‘low-rise sweatpants-super tight tank top-ridiculously well-defined arm muscles’ glory.

“Hi Kyu. Please, come in.”

“Kyuhyun… thanks” he barely made out the correction before he effectively lost the ability to speak.

Siwon moved his (ridiculously well-defined) arms to motion the younger boy to come into the house. Kyuhyun walked in to the house past Siwon and mentally had to remind himself to keep his jaw off the floor. His hands started to sweat and a red patina climbed up his neck and spread across his face. It wasn’t just the clothes, or lack thereof; Siwon had a soft red flush across his cheeks, his eyes looked sleepy but they seemed to sparkle, and there was something extremely, no, strike that, sinfully attractive about the way Siwon’s hair was slightly ruffled and sticking up at odd angles as if he’d just got out of bed. The term ‘-hair’ briefly flashed through Kyuhyun’s mind before he could stop it. He tried to shake it off as he ran his hands through his own hair.

Thankfully Siwon interrupted his thought process.“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to but I kind of dozed off for a second so I haven’t really had the chance to change. Do you mind if I…”

“Go ahead” he practically spat out before the older boy could finish. He figured it would probably be good if the older boy was wearing a little bit more. He tried to add a joke to lighten his mood and keep himself from going completely weak in the knees. “Just hurry before Ara has the chance to burn down our entire apartment building.”

Siwon laughed and Kyuhyun’s stomach twirled. So much for not going weak in the knees. He watched Siwon walk away and as he did, the older boy casually pulled his tank top over his head before shutting his door. Kyuhyun was left gaping. He blinked a few times and tried to swallow before cursing to himself.

“Damn…”

Siwon had the body of a Greek sculpture, albeit a very tan Greek sculpture. His shoulders were broad and his waist tapered down to where his sweatpants hung loosely off his hips. Kyuhyun practically had to wipe the drool from his chin. He was pretty sure there was no way a human being could possibly be that attractive, or should be for that matter.

He looked down and pulled up his shirt. His stomach was flat and firm. If you looked hard enough you could even see abs. Saying that he was jealous of Siwon’s body would be an understatement, though even if he had Siwon’s abs, height and skin color, he would still have the scars from the accident.

Kyuhyun had a number of scars running up his thighs and lower back where his legs were trapped between broken sheets of metal and glass, but the long scar trailing from his belly button to the top of his rib-cage was his least favorite. It was silvery-white and it puffed up against the surrounding skin. He ran his finger up the length of the scar before lowering his shirt back down with a sigh. He avoided taking his shirt off when at all possible. He didn’t like to be reminded of the accident, and he hated the way that the scars made his body look. It made him feel weak.

He looked up when he heard Siwon come back out from his room and he blushed hoping Siwon hadn’t seen the scars. He’s blind you idiot, he reminded himself, and it was almost a good thing because Kyuhyun stared. He stared shamelessly. The older boy looked nearly as good in clothes as he did out of them. He was wearing a silky, fitted grey shirt; the two top buttons were undone, showing off a bit off his tan chest and the way his pants clung… Well, Kyuhyun stared.

 “Ready when you are” the older boy said nearly causing him to fall backwards with shock.

“Oh, um… yeah right sure, um I’m ready too.” he mumbled nearly incoherent to Siwon.

He turned and walked out of the house only to pause a second later at Siwon’s burst of laughter. He covered his eyes and started laughing along. He turned around and walked back into the house.  

“I, um, forgot again. About… I’m sorry.” He said biting his lip and staring at Siwon’s feet. “I bet that happens all the time.”

“No, actually, it’s never happened before. It’s the first time anyone has even forgotten about me being blind. Well, repeatedly forgotten.” A smile reached his eyes and Kyuhyun smiled shyly back.

For a second there was an awkward silence. Trying not to look directly at Siwon, Kyuhyun gathered up his nerves and boldly walked over to Siwon before not-so-boldly grabbing the older boy’s hand. He fumbled a little, palms sweating, and he gulped uneasily as he pulled Siwon out of the house shutting the door behind them. Amazingly though, Siwon didn’t protest.

He walked them towards the car in complete silence. They stood by the car for a few seconds before Kyuhyun cleared his throat and pulled his hand away.

“Um, we’re here” he said looking at his feet. “Here,” he said opening the passenger side door.

He blushed wildly when Siwon made some joke about him being a great date and it took him a second to calm himself down before he started the car. Just a joke, just a joke, he repeated in his head before stepping on the ignition.

The car ride was silent. Kyuhyun focused on not hitting any stray pedestrians and since he was keeping his eyes on the road he didn’t notice Siwon wringing his hands together at a ridiculously quick pace. When they stopped in front of Kyuhyun’s building he got out of the car and to his relief Siwon got out of the car too. He walked over to the older boy and smiled.

“Well, we’re here” he said stating the blatantly obvious.

Siwon smiled and held out his hand.

For a second, Kyuhyun wondered if it was an apparition and his stomach fluttered, but he gladly took the older boy’s hand. He walked them to the elevator in his building and pushed the up button. They stood there hand-in-hand; Siwon smiling as if completely oblivious to the nerve-wrecked boy standing by his side and Kyuhyun staring wide-eyed off into space and wondering how long it takes for a freaking elevator to get to the bottom floor. I mean seriously! How long could it possible take for the elevator to-

*bing*

Kyuhyun yelped at the noise and Siwon turned his head towards the younger boy.

“You okay?” he asked still smiling, though Kyuhyun couldn’t help but notice it wasn’t as full of a smile as it was a few seconds ago.

“Yeah, the elevator was loud I guess. It kind of surprised me.”

Siwon chuckled and pulled Kyuhyun into the elevator. He calmly felt along the buttons until he found the one for the fourth floor and pressed it quickly. Kyuhyun wondered for a second how Siwon knew he lived on the fourth floor but his thoughts were cut off when the elevator doors closed in front of him.

You could cut the tension in the elevator with a knife; A very, very dull butter knife. Kyuhyun couldn’t think of anything to say and apparently neither could Siwon. Kyunhyun felt the silence closing in around him and started shaking slightly. He could have sworn he felt Siwon calmingly caress his hand, but when he looked down the older boy’s hand was perfectly still. He loosened his grip a bit, but Siwon didn’t let go.

“So what are we having for dinner?” The older boy said finally breaking the awkward silence. “I’m assuming you were joking about Ara being a horrible cook, and hopefully about her burning down the house too.”

The elevator had only gone up two floors, but to Kyuhyun it felt as if they had been in that small, claustrophobic box for days. He breathed out in relief and the sudden calm that always seemed to accompany Siwon’s presence settled in as he let out his nerves in a breathy laugh.

“No, I was dead serious. I have the fire department on speed dial just in case.” he said jokingly. “Happens at least once a month, but don’t worry, they have an incredible response time.”

Siwon laughed loudly, showing off his amazing dimples and Kyuhyun grinned in response.

“Well at least they have a good response time. That’s pretty important.” Siwon joked back. “If the fire doesn’t kill us, will the food? Eating charcoal can’t be good for your health, but I would hate to be impolite. My mother taught me to eat everything I’m given when I’m a guest at someone’s home.”

“And they say chivalry is dead.”

*bing*

The elevator stopped and the door opened slowly. To his surprise and extreme annoyance Jessica was standing outside the doors talking to a good looking guy about her makeup, which Kyuhyun found more than a little obnoxious. Siwon pulled his hand quickly from Kyuhyun’s and rubbed the back of his neck.

“Jess.” He said sounding uncomfortable

“Siwon, Oh my gosh how are you? I didn’t realize you were going to be here tonight.” She replied pulling the older boy into a tight embrace.

Kyuhyun figured Siwon was ashamed to be seen with him and his stomach dropped at the thought. Holding hands was pretty incriminating evidence. Even if Siwon was blind and did need help to get around. Kyuhyun walked angrily out past Jessica who was happily chatting with Siwon and rolled his eyes.

When Jessica was done introducing Siwon to don’t-cares-who-he-is, and she had left with still-don’t-care-who-he-is, Kyuhyun had his hands stuffed as far into his pockets as they would go. Nobody, he thought annoyed at his own stupidity, is going to be embarrassed by me.

“Sorry about that.” Siwon said.

Kyuhyun noticed Siwon’s hand still entangled in his short hair at the back of his neck and his stomach clenched again.

“Not your fault” he said dryly, hands still in his jean pockets.

Siwon held his hand out again and Kyuhyun almost scoffed. He pulled out one of his hands and grabbed Siwon’s shirt at the elbow and pulled him into the apartment.

He let go as soon as they were inside and Ara came running over with a huge smile on her face.

“Siwonnie!” She screamed happily and wrapped her arms around his strong frame.

He picked her up and spun her around before putting her back on the ground. He smiled widely and asked how she was doing. Kyuhyun grimaced and walked into his room almost slamming the door with the force he put into shutting out Siwon and his sister. He dropped his head and sat down on the edge of his bed.

“It’s not fair. She’s already hugged him twice… No Kyuhyun, he’s just a friend… If you’re lucky” he said out loud, sighing as he laid flat on his back. “Get a grip Kyuhyun. Just a friend.”

Hey, sorry for being MIA for a while. I promise to try and do better. Life is just a bit hectic. It is life after all. I hope you like this chapter!!! :) Love you all!

P.S. SiwonnieFan, thanks for your message, and thanks for the "fighting!" This one's for you :D