feels like home
pg-13, canon, ~7756w

a/n:  This fic was written by both Yuri (@Product) and I. We were inspired by Yuri's  next flight (canon!changyoon, which is set few years into the future), so this is basically a side-fic from Next Flight! Hope you'll like it as much as we do<3 also, this fic is posted in livejournal in our community @pygalgia, and that's it, no where else. :) 

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Boa had always known it was only a matter of time before this day would come. She does not dread it but she does not yearn for it either. He knows this so he does not bother to call in advance, he won’t mention it to a friend, he won’t construct a polite message - he sneaks up on her, like an overdue heart attack.

Yunho goes around and comes around, every cycle begins and ends on her couch.



-



She’s watching him from the door of his room (previously her guestroom), leaning casually against the doorframe as she munches on a piece of bread slowly. He’s unpacking, throwing clothes onto the bed and arranging a few books on the desk by the corner. Boa follows his every movement in amusement; it’s a little ridiculous how comfortable he is acting when it’s been months since they’ve last had a proper conversation with each other.

It’s ridiculous, but it’s also Yunho.

“I didn’t know you read.” She pipes up softly, and he turns around with a grin on his face.

“Looks like you don’t know everything about your best friend.” Yunho teases, and Boa rolls her eyes in a playful manner. “How can I when you’re so busy being a superstar in Seoul?”

“Were.” He corrects briskly. “And I don’t think you can call a musical actor a superstar. Our idol days are over, Boa.”

It’s true, in a sense. It’s been a few years since Dong Bang Shin Ki disbanded, also a few years since Boa has left Seoul to focus full-time on song-writing, and if she is to be true to herself, Boa has no idea what has been going on with the lives of her labelmates. Changmin for one, has disappeared to god-knows where, and if it isn’t because he would still send her some text messages or call her occasionally, Boa would have thought he had died. Siwon, Yeonhee and Ara are still in touch, of course, but they hardly ever had the time to come visit. Her juniors, Yoona and Sooyoung, have established themselves well as an actress. Taeyeon’s songs are still playing in the nearby cafes she would visit, and that’s about all that she knows about her labelmates.

Silence fills the air once again as Yunho chucks his clothes from his bed into the small wardrobe by the door. He closes the wardrobe drawers and leans against it, now staring at Boa as she takes another bite from her bread. “What? Why are you staring at me?”

Yunho gives her a lopsided grin, one she has not seen in years. “So...are you going to tell me what’s so great about the countryside, or am I going to have to force you to show me around?”

“It’s different.” She answers simply. “More peaceful. It’s a change I needed.”

He hesitates to say something, but Boa gives him the green light to speak up (as she always would). “Did you have to go so far, though?”

Boa removes herself from the doorframe and tiptoes into the room lightly, carefully. It’s his personal space now, she thinks to herself before whirling around to look at Yunho. “It’s a fresh start. The air is different, the people are different…”

“No one recognizes you?” Yunho raises an eyebrow skeptically. Boa laughs and shakes her head. “Not always, thankfully. And you should be grateful too, since you’re going to stay here with me.”

Yunho doesn’t say anything, merely smiles as he crosses his arms to observe the woman in front of him. She still looks the same, acts the same, yet there is something different about her that he couldn’t exactly pinpoint.

“Oh, it’s time for Yoona’s drama.” Boa announces suddenly, noticing the time on the clock ticking on Yunho’s desk. She leaves the room with Yunho following behind. “You follow Yoona’s drama?”

“Of course. Sooyoung’s too.” Boa plops herself down on her couch, reaching for the remote as Yunho hovers around, uncertain of what to do. “They’re good. I’m surprised you don’t follow their dramas. Aren’t they close to you?”

Yunho finally settles down at the other end of the couch. “They were. But, you know, life got in the way. The last I’ve seen them was during Sooyoung’s wedding, if I remember correctly.”

“Ah, the wedding.” Boa nods, though her eyes are fixed on the tv screen. She remembers the younger female’s church wedding; it was small and private, those who attended were mostly family or close friends. The wedding was simply beautiful, and Boa remembers wishing that she wanted one of the same for herself, someday, perhaps.

The opening theme of Yoona’s drama starts playing, and Boa steals a glance at the individual seated at the far end of her couch. “Yunho?” She hesitates when she sees him looking at her with a puzzled look.

“Yeah?”

Boa pats the empty seat beside her. And as easily as she knows it is going to be, Yunho slides into that seat briskly. She curls herself into a ball and leans against her friend, his arm gently finding its position around her waist. She is half watching her drama, half listening to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat.

“I’ve missed you.”

She could feel Yunho nodding as he pulls her closer to him. “Me too.”




-




Boa’s not the type to snoop and especially not when it comes to him.

She’s not a believer in blind faith, she just believes in him. And not that Yunho was ever any good at hiding things from her; for decades now she has consistently been the first person he tells anything to and vice versa. They know each other like the back of their own hands - it has become easy for them to trace the lines that lead them to the things they may not say but share.

So it does disconcert her enough to knock over his pile of books when she catches sight of the email notification but more so, the writer of it. Panic stricken by the little rectangle that is fading as quickly as it had appeared, Boa doesn’t think, she just acts.

Hi oppa,

I hope you reached the countryside safely and getting all the rest you need. I know you said you’ll be out of contact for a while but I thought I should just check in on you anyway. I heard it’s much colder up there than it is in Seoul, so please take care of yourself and wear a lot of warm clothes, I know how much you like taking those night walks.

This will really be nothing to you but the premier of my new project that I’ve been telling you about is coming up soon. I’ve been preparing really hard for this role. It would mean the world to me if you could make it.

Yours faithfully, Yujin.

Yours, faithfully - the words keep swirling together so does the rest of the room. How naive is this girl, really? Certainly not as naive as she is but still, how long does Yujin, no, Uee, think she’s been his for? And how little does she think it takes for one to be faithful? Uee should ask Boa about it, she would know about it better than anyone else.

After all Boa did spend majority of her life vowing to live by those two things yet here she is, giving but never receiving.



-




It is as though a switch has been switched on in Boa’s mind, for after that accidental moment of reading Yunho’s mail, she begins to notice things. Even the littlest.

This paranoia begins with a harmless act, one that might not have meant anything if Boa hadn’t stumbled upon that email a few days ago. They are doing the dishes together after dinner, Boa wanting to keep the plates in the cupboard above. As she tiptoes and curses silently at the previous house owner for designing cupboards against the wall that are so far above her height, she hears him chuckling behind her.

“You’re really short.”

She grunts, rolling her eyes. “Tell me something I don’t already know.”

“If you were just slightly taller…” He is teasing her and she knows it. Yet, when Boa hears that coming from him, all she could think of is a particular woman known for her tall height and model figure. That thought came into her mind so quickly that she didn’t have the time to even block it.

She freezes, not knowing what to snap back in return.

“Hey, I’m just kidding.” Yunho nudges her back gently, reaching for the plates in her hand as he swiftly keeps them into the cupboard instead. Boa puts on a smile, that’s the only action she could think to do at the moment. Of course she knows he’s joking, of course she knows that he thinks her proportions are fine. This has been a running joke; her complaining about her height and him teasing but comforting her in return. Tonight though, it suddenly doesn’t seem funny anymore.

Boa pushes the thought away, keeping it hidden in the deepest recesses of her mind. She isn’t going to let some stupid email affect her relationship with Yunho, is what she repeats over and over again in her mind when she tries to fall asleep.

That thought remains until two days later, when she tries to switch channels to watch one of her favourite dramas, only to have Yunho suddenly grabbing her hand and telling her to wait.

“Wh--” She barely even needs to ask as she looks up then and sees the reason why.

The current channel is playing an advertisement for an upcoming drama. Boa could feel a lump forming against as the leading actress appears on the screen. She dare not look at Yunho directly, although it is killing her to see what his reaction is at the moment.

When the advertisement ends, Boa meekly pulls her arm away. “Done? Can I change the channel now?” She honestly doesn’t understand why she’s being so courteous when this is her goddamn house and she is entitled to watch whichever channel she wants to at whatever time she wishes to. Why is she asking for his permission?

“Yeah, sure.” He answers, and she immediately knows why.

Boa wants to see his reaction when he answers her question. And she got her wish, all right. He had replied with a beaming face, and it didn’t take a genius to know why.

She presses the remote control with a heavy heart, eyes barely focusing on the screen in front of her as her mind begins to wander again.



-




It’s nothing, she tells herself the next morning. It’s nothing to worry about. Don’t let it get inside your head. It’s--

A vain attempt, she finishes in her head without even realising, when the word she had wanted to use was going to be okay.

Boa grips onto her mug so tightly her knuckles are turning white. She is silently observing Yunho from the couch, how he’s so absorbed in scribbling stuffs onto his personal journal - the one where Boa has never bothered to ask if she could read, because she knows he had already told her all that he wanted her to know.

A buzz from the phone is enough for Yunho to shift his attention. There’s a smile that is gradually forming on his lips, and it is leaving an uneasy feeling in Boa’s stomach. He quickly typed a reply before returning to his journal, and Boa begins to count the seconds for the next message to arrive.

Her heart sinks further when she hears the buzzing again, and she is only at her fifth second. Boa wants to believe that it is nothing, that the message is probably from someone she personally knows and she shouldn’t have to feel guilty for observing and judging her best friend like this. But as another smile lights up on Yunho’s face, Boa doesn’t know what to believe in anymore.

Yunho gets up suddenly, phone in his hand as he rapidly presses the screen. He barely even glances at Boa as he gestures that he would be outside for a while.

Before Boa could block herself from hearing anything, she hears a hey, it’s me, I’m really excited for you…

And Yunho is gone from the living room.

Boa is up on her feet before she knows it, makes her way towards the table before she even realises what she is doing. She picks the journal up hesitantly, before putting it down again. She drums her fingers against the table, contemplating for a few more seconds before making up her mind that if she doesn’t find out, she probably won’t be able to stop acting like a paranoid girlfriend.

She freezes at that thought, shaking her head a few times to correct herself. She had meant friend, not girlfriend.

Boa scoffs suddenly. It is directed at herself, for how pathetic she is at the moment. Yunho would be disappointed if he finds out she is acting this way. Why is she risking their friendship like this? Over a matter that had been supposedly resolved years ago? A matter that, if she hadn’t read that email, she probably wouldn’t have allowed it to bother her mind again?

She slams the journal down a little too hard on the desk; some loose contents flew out from it in a swift motion. Boa bends down to pick the pages or papers, noticing immediately that they aren’t part of Yunho’s journal.

That is enough as an invitation to begin looking through the papers one by one. Her heart is pounding and the guilt is overwhelming, yet she couldn’t stop herself from leafing through, eyes scanning word after word on the papers briskly. Boa finds herself sitting down when something catches her attention. Just a single word on the top left of the piece of paper--it’s a letter--is enough for her to hold her breath.

Congratulations, Yunho oppa!

Boa reads the sentences as quickly as she could. She only wants to understand the gist of the letter, not what was behind it and what it could possibly imply. By the time she reaches the end of the letter, she is trembling.

Love, Yujin.

This letter is dated years back, after Yunho was discharged from the army, just a few months before--

Boa suddenly finds it extremely hard to breathe. She drops the letter onto the desk and edges away. She feels sick, nauseous, wishes that she didn’t let curiosity get into her earlier. It would have been better if she didn’t find that letter.

It shouldn’t affect her so much, honestly, it’s just a congratulatory letter. It’s only affecting her this much because it’s Uee--Uee, not Yujin, because Boa’s never been on that level to be able to call her by her birth name--because it’s the same Uee that Yunho has been in a rumor with, the same Uee who Yunho didn’t want to talk about when she asked about her years ago.

This is the same Uee that Yunho says he’s friends with and nothing more, yet he couldn’t speak with her when he’s in the same room with Boa. The same Uee who could have invited her many other celebrity friends to her project premier, yet she chose to invite Yunho. The same Uee who is ideal and perfect, who visited Yunho while he was in the army before she herself even had the chance to.

This is the very same person Boa had first thought of when the inevitable happened.



-



Boa made herself promise to let it go. She promises to leave it be, to just accept what Yunho has told her last time, to just believe and trust in him. After all, isn’t that what her friendship with him is made of - trust?

But no matter how much she tried, she just couldn’t. Not when it is eating her up slowly, and especially not when she couldn’t even look at Yunho now without her mind wondering and imagining things.

She knows it is not okay to be doing this--how can it be okay to snoop around and go through all his personal belongings without telling him? This clearly violates any rules (be it silent or verbal) they’ve established among themselves, yet Boa thinks to herself that this is clearly the last of her concern at the moment.

“What are you doing?”

Boa doesn’t even flinch when she hears his voice from the door. She could hear clear surprise in his tone, but there’s also a hint of not wanting to jump into any conclusion. She doesn’t even look up when she replies him in a manner so curt, that Yunho begins to feel more concerned than he is mad.

“I need answers.”

“And you can find them in my desk drawers, how?”

Boa ignores him as she continues rummaging through his personal belongings. She could see him from the corner of her eyes, flustered and confused before finally taking steps towards her. “Talk to me, Boa. What is going on?”

“I told you,” She says in a matter of fact, her tone calm. “I need answers.”

She stops in midair as Yunho gently but firmly grabs her arm, forcing her to stop. “Look at me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
Boa takes a deep breath and counts to three. She snatches her hand away and glances up. “Remember Uee? Wait, I meant Yujin. Yeah, I’m sure you remember her.”

Yunho furrows his eyebrows. “What do you mean? Of course I remember Yujin, she’s…”

“You know, back then, you never wanted to tell me what’s going on between you two.” Boa interrupts as she takes a step away from Yunho. “Why?”

“What?” Yunho frowns. “Didn’t I tell you that we were just friends?”

Boa forces a smile, blinking back tears. “Right. Just friends.”

“Why are you being like this?” Yunho half pleads, half wonders what he has done that Boa is on the verge of crying in front of him.

“I’m starting to think that there was more to what happened when you wanted to…” She trails off, hastily wiping her tears away as she starts to walk away. But of course, Boa barely takes three steps before she is stopped.

“What are you implying?” He asks, his face marred with aghast. “You’re not making any sense right now, Boa.”

“You know what I’m implying. You and her.” She whispers, suddenly tired of explaining and wanting very much to just go to sleep. “I-I can’t do this right now.”

Boa is halfway across the room when Yunho comes in front of her again. She sighs, running a hand over her hair in frustration. Tonight is not the night, she tells herself over and over again, not the night to ruin what is left of your friendship with Yunho.

“Is this how much you trust me?” Yunho says, the hurt evident in his expression and Boa suddenly feels like she cannot keep herself calm anymore. “You started this. You can’t just walk out now.”

“Me?” She is on the verge of exploding. “I’m the one who started this?”

“You are the one snooping through my stuffs and then not telling me why. You are the one accusing me of things I’m not even sure what. Are you trying to say that I started all that?”

“I wasn't the one who wanted to—“ Boa stops herself quickly, biting the words back as she throws her hands up. “Fine. Fine.”

Yunho shakes his head a few times. “What does that even mean?”

“It means,” Boa takes another deep breath, her heart pounding so hard she could hear the thumping in her head. “that you should leave. I can’t take this anymore.”

The words that came out from Boa’s mouth surprises Yunho so much that he takes a step back in disbelief. “What?”

“You heard me, Yunho. Please.” In all truth and honesty, Boa never would have imagined a day where she would beg for him to leave. “Leave.”

“I’m not going to leave.” Yunho says firmly.

Boa knows what he’s doing; Yunho’s trying to fix this relationship. Whatever that’s left, anyway. She also knows that he’s doing a damn poor job. Because if he even knows her, claims to know her best, he would have turned around and left without fighting back.

“Look, didn’t we promise, back when that happened, that we would still remain in good terms with each other?”

That’s it, Boa thinks to herself, I can’t be patient anymore.

“God forbid me to spell this out to you, Yunho. You don’t get it, do you? You don’t just go back to being the best