It's past midnight already but Jongin’s reunion party is still pretty much alive. Blasting music, loud laughter, and the excited shouts haven’t died down although the party’s been on for five hours now and there are only twelve of them in Jongin’s house.

But only ten people are really enjoying the party; only ten people are truly happy to meet each other once again.

Baekhyun is unusually quiet, sitting on the couch alone, while Chanyeol is busy faking a smile every now and then so that the oblivious Yixing will never know that the boy he’s talking to isn’t really in the mood to be in the party.

Once Yixing finishes retelling what happened to him during the past two years after EXO disbanded, Chanyeol finally walks over to sit next to Baekhyun. They’re so close that their legs are pressed against each other but both of them won’t deny that it feels like they’re strangers who have no idea about who is sitting next to them.

“How have you been, Baekhyun?” Chanyeol manages to throw a question before the silence between them tears his heart open more.

Neither of them sees how they mentally wince at how Chanyeol calls the older boy ‘Baekhyun’, not ‘Baekkie’ or any other nicknames like he did when everything between them was still okay.

Baekhyun tries hard to show a small smile. “Good.”

“Of course,” Chanyeol lets out an awkward chuckle before fishing out his phone and asking for Baekhyun’s. “Remember how we used to listen to English songs together to fix our pronunciation? I like this song.”

Baekhyun’s eyebrows arch when he reads the title of the song after the taller has successfully transferred it to his phone.

“Let’s listen to it now.”

Baekhyun taps on the file and closes his eyes to concentrate on the song, keeping the phone between their ears but closer to his. The music fo