Part Three: "Falling Behind"

Baekhyun walked on drifting clouds, searching high and low for the past that he wished to live in. People always tell us to move on with our lives, but although Baekhyun knows that he should take such advice, he doesn’t want to. He hated the fact that he knew Chanyeol was pressing forward, and Baekhyun just kept on slamming the rewind button. But he knows time doesn’t wait for anyone.

“Hey, Chanyeol.” Baekhyun nudged Chanyeol’s with the latter’s guitar in the hopes of catching his attention. Chanyeol doesn’t respond so Baekhyun waits for ten seconds, which feels like an eternity until Chanyeol breaks out into a grin before typing something out onto his phone again. “Hey, Chanyeol.” Baekhyun repeats with a more yearning tone to his quiet voice, but Chanyeol doesn’t respond and only chuckles as his screen lights up with “Park Sandara”

“Hey, Park Chanyeol!” Baekhyun finally shouts into his friend’s ear with frustration.

“What the hell, Baekhyun?! Why are you yelling?” Chanyeol clutches his ear overdramatically as the phone in his lap continues to flash the image of Dara and Chanyeol’s beaming faces.

“Are you serious?” Baekhyun scoffed before slumping back into his beanbag chair. “I’ve called your name two times while I was right next to you and you never responded!”

“Oh, sorry man. I was texting-”

“Your wonderful bottle of sunshine. Yeah, I get it.” Baekhyun groaned in detest, ever since Chanyeol got into a relationship with Dara, he rarely spoke with Baekhyun. The only time they would ever have a conversation was when Baekhyun texted him first or whenever they bumped into each other in the crowded hallways.

“Well I can’t help it, she’s just so-”

“Wooonderful.” Baekhyun drawled out sarcastically before grumbling to himself as Chanyeol looked at him peculiarly.

“Are you okay, Baekhyun? You’ve been looking a bit grumpy since last week.” Chanyeol quirked an eyebrow up high. Baekhyun tilted his head upwards to stare into Chanyeol’s eyes before the latter received another text and averted his gaze towards his girlfriend’s text message. Baekhyun looked over Chanyeol with sad eyes and an unreadable expression sewn into his face. Chanyeol had gotten a haircut a week ago and began to swish his hair upwards, just like Baekhyun used to. Baekhyun’s hair was strewn across his head messily now, and he seemed more slim, cheekbones more prominent and wrists dangerously skinny.

“I’m feeling well, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Baekhyun lied, but he knew Chanyeol was too caught up in his other priorities to care. He waited for the longest time for Chanyeol to question if he was a liar, just as they always did, but that time never came. “Hey, Yeol.”

“Hm?” He finally looked up from his gleaming phone to notice Baekhyun slumped up against the pristine walls as if he had no bones to support his body.

“Do you want to go see that movie today?”

“What movie?”

“The movie you’ve been raving about since last month? That one action movie with sorcerers-”

“Oh, that one?” Chanyeol snapped in remembrance with a grin on his face, so Baekhyun lights up for a little while the hopes that maybe he would finally be able to get out of his hellhole of a house with his best friend for the first time in three weeks. “Nah, I can’t, sorry Baekhyun.”

“Wait, why?” Baekhyun’s stomach dropped, because that meant he’d have to endure only being able to study and consume some weird “health shakes” which are the only things that he is permitted to eat for as long as he doesn’t have any visitors. It’s torture, to only be fed some peanuts, water and a blend of vegetables everyday. “We’ve been planning to go one that one for a while now.”

“Well, you see, the thing is…” Chanyeol fiddled around with his fingers for a bit before looking up to meet Baekhyun’s stare with guilt. “Dara and I were planning on going to see that one on Wednesday.”

“Oh.” That measly word was all Baekhyun could manage without sounding too disappointed or too furious. It was such a pathetic “oh” as well, he couldn’t even dribble out a sturdy “oh”. It kind of just hung in the air to Chanyeol’s uneasiness.

“You’re not mad, are you, Baek?” Chanyeol put his phone to the side of his leg as he inspected Baekhyun’s neutral expression. But Chanyeol know that when Baekhyun looked like he was about to sleep, it is when he has a thousand questions and only one hundred answers roaming around his mind.

“I’m not mad, Chanyeol.” He was just left out.

Chanyeol walked through the halls with his head up this time, he walked with a faster pace, as if he had somewhere he had to go, somewhere he belonged. For the longest time, he felt so out of place in the confinement of the narrow school halls. But now, thanks to Dara, he had met new friends as people began to see him a different light. It’s crazy how much one person can change your life, and Dara completely brought Chanyeol back to life. The way she laughed, the way she squealed whenever Chanyeol hugged her and the way she was so welcoming was what drew Chanyeol in. She never turned anyone away from her, no matter how bad their “reputation” was told to be.

The tall eighteen year old strolled into the cafeteria, not bothering with the lunch line since he never really ate lunch at school anyways. He headed straight for the table where Baekhyun was looking straight at him with a weak smile and a flimsy book in hand.

“Chanyeol!” He stopped in his tracks at the sound of her voice and turned his head to see his girlfriend waving him over to her table with a cheery grin upon her face. Chanyeol was lovestruck, the only thing he saw was Sandara, so he quickly paced himself over to her table.

Baekhyun felt his stomach drop one last time, the last time. He felt it, he felt the numbness hit him with a pang as it began to travel and course through his veins once again. It was a familiar feeling, but it wasn’t very pleasant. The feeling of not knowing what to feel or how to feel, it drove him crazy that he wasn’t feeling anything besides foreignness. He felt out of place again, he felt alien.

With much regret, he turned his head over to look at Chanyeol laughing with his new friends with glee scrawled out on his entire body. He looked so happy, so Baekhyun was happy too. But he wasn’t happy for himself, he was happy that Chanyeol had finally found himself out there. He was satisfied that the Chanyeol he met two years ago, the Chanyeol that shielded his face with a hood and looked at everyone with swollen eyes had grown into a happy virus. And although Chanyeol was happy without Baekhyun, he could live with that, but Baekhyun could live with the idea of being alone again. He couldn’t live with himself, not again, not ever.