HAPPY NEW YEAR, READERS! <3 first thing first, i got the idea for this after watching a japanese movie entitled 'yuuki' a few days ago and then i remembered i've read a fanfic similar to that story written by purrrplehong13 about b2st. so i think it'd be okay to write it in baekyeol version with different story background but if you guys think this is plagiarism, i'll just take this down. ><

“Let’s go for another round!”

A chorus of “no” blasts in the small dance practice room right after the dance tutor finishes his sentence. He just shakes his index finger, signaling that he doesn’t accept the protest from the thirty sweating trainees in front of him. “Do you guys want to debut or not? You have no time to lack off! Or do you guys want me to tell the boards that none of you deserves to be debuted in a group?”

“Please, hyung. Our bodies also have limits,” even Jongin, the boy who is like a dance machine, begs for a stop.

Junmyeon places his hands on his knees, panting. “We promise to learn the dance later in our houses, hyung.”

There are also some whispers along the lines of ‘we don’t even know if we’ll get debuted’ and ‘we may be trainees forever’ that anger the dance tutor.

“We haven’t even finished the moves until the end of this song and you guys are already complaining? Are you guys even ready to be idol?” when he hears no reply, he just rolls his eyes and sets his eyes on the tall boy who’s been getting on his nerves since the beginning of their practice today. “You, Chanyeol! What the hell did you do forgetting the moves we’ve learned, huh?”

“I… I’m sorry, hyung,” Chanyeol’s voice cracks as he looks down on the wooden floor, sweat dripping down from his forehead. “I’ll do better.”

“Of course you should do better!” the dance tutor barks at Chanyeol, his finger jabbing Chanyeol’s left shoulder. “You’re lucky to be blessed with height and face, Park Chanyeol, and also that deep voice of yours. In case you forgot, there are hundreds of talented teenagers out there who never get the chance to be trainees in this company, so you better polish your skills or just walk out of this company out of self-awareness.”

The whole room is silent, only the ticks of the clock hanging on the wall can be heard. None of the trainees dares to speak when the situation has gotten this tense. This kind of situation has been happening for a while now, and it always involves Chanyeol and his lack of dancing skill. The other trainees think that Chanyeol isn’t that horrible in dancing; well, he belongs to the rapper group so dancing isn’t his ultimate focus, right?

“Fine. I’m feeling generous so I’ll stop the practice now. I’ll see you guys in the next dance practice,” the dance tutor finally sighs. He gathers all his things before leaving the room.

“Finally,” Baekhyun heaves out a sigh and lies down on the wooden floor like a starfish. “I thought I was going to die.”

“Me too, hyung,” Kyungsoo says, sitting down cross-legged next to a stone-faced trainee named Sehun. “It feels like I won’t be able to move even a muscle anymore.”

Baekhyun is about to grab his water bottle when he sees Chanyeol biting his lower lip hard, a hand on the spot where the dance tutor jabbed him and eyes shut tightly. It hurts his heart to see the happy-go-lucky giant to be in pain like that. “Chanyeol? Are you okay?”

It takes a few seconds for Chanyeol to nod his head and smile, but Baekhyun knows better that something is wrong—he’s his best friend afterall. However, can a jab be that painful?

///

Baekhyun glances at his Nike wristwatch and clicks his tongue. “Why are they this late?”

Today is Sunday which means no training schedule and he’s waiting for Kyungsoo and Chanyeol in front of their favorite soondae restaurant. He promised the two boys that if he passed his biology exam with good mark, he’d treat them soondae. So when his teacher returned the exam sheets and he saw a red A on his, he immediately texted the good news to his two best friends.

Baekhyun frowns upon noticing that his best friends are already two hours late, which is so unusual. He fishes out his phone and is about to text Chanyeol again when someone slings their arm over his neck. He turns his head only to see a familiar big grin he’s grown to adore. “What took you guys so long, Chanyeol?”

“Something happened,” Kyungsoo replies shortly from behind.

Baekhyun arches his eyebrows at Chanyeol, wanting to get clearer reason since he knows well that Kyungsoo doesn’t talk much about something upsetting.

“It’s just… something. Not really important, I swear,” Chanyeol’s grin is off for a second before it’s visible again. “Let’s just go in! I’m hungry!”

Baekhyun doesn’t like to be dragged here and there, but he can’t find it in himself to be upset to an over excited Chanyeol who has just grabbed his wrist and pulled him into the soondae restaurant.

None of the two boys sees how Kyungsoo covers his mouth and blinks back his tears.

///

Baekhyun rushes up to the second floor where the dance practice room is, not caring that his hair gets messy because of that. He got detention today for being late to Mr. Kwon’s history class which leads to him being late for his training sessions.

“Yah! Byun Baekhyun!” the dance tutor shouts at him the moment he steps into the dance practice room. He hates it when trainees come late because it will just pause the training session every now and then.

“I’m so sorry for coming late, hyung,” Baekhyun bows before dropping his postman bag on the floor and gets on the back line with some Chinese trainees. He doesn’t even bother to explain why he came late because he’s sure the dance tutor won’t care.

“Okay, guys. Repeat from the start!” the dance tutor hollers and plays the music to restart the dance practice.

God must be pitying all the trainees today because the training session ends in just two hours while it usually takes four or five hours long just for dance practice.

“Oh thanks, God!” a Chinese trainee on Baekhyun’s left, Luhan, heaves out a sigh before plopping down on the wooden floor. He then tugs on the hem of Baekhyun’s hoodie. “Hey, where’s your giant?”

Baekhyun looks down in confusion. “Who?”

“Your giant,” Luhan yawns tiredly. “Chanyeol.”

As if the magic spell has been removed, Baekhyun frantically turns his head to the left and right, searching for a particular lanky boy. He furrows his eyebrows as he can’t find him because Park Chanyeol never skips training session unless it’s extremely urgent.

“He’s not quitting, is he?”

“Well, I—” Baekhyun catches a sight of Kyungsoo hurriedly gathering all his stuffs. “Kyungsoo!”

The doe-eyed boy jumps in surprise a bit but still looks at Baekhyun after that. “Yeah?”

“Do you know where Chanyeol is?”

There’s something unreadable on Kyungsoo’s face—a mixture of fear, nervousness, and things Baekhyun can’t tell.

“Kyungsoo?”

“I—I…”

Baekhyun starts feeling suspicious. “Hm?”

Kyungsoo gnaws at his lower lip for a while before taking steps toward Baekhyun. “Chanyeol hyung is sick.”

“Park Chanyeol can get sick? Aigoo, that boy,” Baekhyun chuckles. “I’ll just visit him in his house, then.”

“Um, actually…” Kyungsoo trails off, eyes glued on the wooden floor.

“What?” Baekhyun sees Kyungsoo is ready to answer but someone just has to choose that moment to dial him up. He holds his hand up, a way to tell Kyungsoo to wait, before picking up the call which is from Chanyeol. “Chanyeol! Where the are you? Why did you not come to training session?”

“Hey, Baekkie!” Chanyeol’s cheery deep voice brings a smile on Baekhyun’s face. “I’m sick so now I’m in the hospital.”

Baekhyun’s eyes grow wide at the mention of the last word and he unconsciously glares at Kyungsoo. “Sick?”

“Come visit me with the others, preferably Kyungsoo! That little boy owes me a cup of ramen~” Chanyeol’s laugh is still melodious as usual, though. “I’m bored and lonely here, Baekkie. Please come here soon.”

For some odd reasons, Baekhyun starts feeling uneasy so he agrees to Chanyeol’s request and cuts the line. The tone Chanyeol used after that laugh was different, as if he really was longing to have some companion.

“Is Chanyeol really sick?” Luhan stands up and worry is clear on his pretty face.

“Y—yeah,” Baekhyun picks up his postman bag from the floor. “I’m going to visit him. I know you know which hospital, Kyungsoo, so you’re coming with me.”

Luhan grabs Baekhyun’s wrist. “Can I come along?”

Without thinking much, Baekhyun gives a simple nod and off they go to the hospital.

It only takes fifteen minutes bus ride to reach the hospital Chanyeol is in. During the ride, Baekhyun has imagined Chanyeol to look weak, lying on the hospital bed, but then he remembered Chanyeol’s cherry voice on the phone earlier and his worry instantly disappeared.

“BAEKKIE!” Chanyeol happily shouts when Baekhyun opens his ward’s door. His face breaks into a huge smile and the way his eyes sparkle is endearing. “You’re here!”

Baekhyun shows a small smile before approaching Chanyeol who is sitting on his hospital bed, leaving Kyungsoo and Luhan standing by the door. He chuckles before coming into Chanyeol’s open arms. “What happened to you? Are you diagnosed with typhus?”

“Nope! Typhus isn’t cool!” Chanyeol laughs, tightening his hug. “I’m fighting against a little monster in my body!”

“Yah!” Baekhyun pulls away. “Don’t joke around with illness.”

A bitter smile makes its way onto Chanyeol’s face. “I’m diagnosed with Gorham’s disease. The name is cool, right?”

Baekhyun freezes. He’s never heard of that kind of disease before but he’s sure it’s not something easy to be cured. “W—what is that?”

“You have Google for God’s sake, Baekkie! Google it!” another laugh escapes Chanyeol’s lips but his eyes show forlornness instead. He looks away to rapidly blink before tilting his body to the side so he can see who else came along. “Kyungsoo! Oh, hi, Luhan!”

Baekhyun just watches as Chanyeol talks animatedly with the other two boys about random things. He notices how different Chanyeol’s laugh although it’s still as loud as ever, how wide Chanyeol’s smile although it doesn’t reach his eyes anymore, and just simply how different Chanyeol is.

///

It’s not until next week that Baekhyun remembers about Chanyeol’s disease. Right after he steps out of the meeting room—he, along with Kyungsoo, Jongin, Junmyeon, Sehun, Luhan, Jongdae, Minseok, Yixing, Tao, and Yifan, has just been confirmed to debut soon in a group under the name of EXO; Chanyeol, too, but he’s still in hospital—he types up that disease’s name in his phone’s Google search with shaking thumbs.

All hail Kyungsoo for being in time to catch Baekhyun’s phone before it hits the ground after the owner found out what Gorham's disease is.

Gorham's disease is a rare bone disorder that is characterized by bone loss (osteolysis) often associated with swelling or abnormal blood vessel growth (angiomatous proliferation). Bone loss can occur in just one bone or spread to soft tissue and adjacent bones. It may affect any part of the skeleton, but most commonly involves the skull, shoulder, and pelvic girdle. The cause of Gorham's disease is currently unknown. No familial predisposition has been found. Because of the rarity of this disease, there is not standard therapy available. Gorham's disease is extremely rare and may occur at any age. It is most often recognized in children and young adults, without gender, race predilection, or inheritance pattern. No single treatment modality has been reported to be proven effective for arresting this disease and there are no known treatments that prevent or control the disease itself.

///

“So, guys, these men over here are going to be your managers. This, is going to be EXO-M’s manager, and this, is going to be EXO-K’s manager.”

Baekhyun only pays half of his attention to the explanation of who is going to be which manager because all he can think of right now is just Chanyeol, Chanyeol, and Chanyeol. He hasn