Tao watched the boy disappear before him. After a long period of time, just before the first bird decided to chirp, did he let his hand fall to his side.

Tao had come across many people before who had needed to change their past, but never had he met one who was willing to change their life for someone else. Tao could see the Luhan boy’s expression, one of such deep pain and loss that it almost could compare to the one Tao had to endure in his immortal years after watching and taking in the countless types of sadness from others.

The boy was happy, content, and Tao could see that more than anyone else could. Tao didn’t understand why the boy would call out to him.

Luhan was wise, Tao thought, but he was also foolish. Foolish enough not to see what the person he desired desires. Even if he was an archangel, Tao could tell almost immediately, just by looking at that Oh Sehun boy that Luhan was his happiness. Luhan had left not realising what made Sehun happy, left with intentions of improving Sehun’s life by removing himself from it, and in the end Luhan had taken Sehun’s main happiness away.

That was more painful to watch than anything else.

Tao knew this time period would not end well. He was a time traveller, time twister, anything to do with time, and with that power he could foresee the future. This future was more bleak and painful than Luhan had intended for it to be, much worse than if Luhan had stayed. With Luhan gone, Sehun would go depressed, mad and eventually insane. He would once again distance himself from his family, be too distracted and once again fail his final year of high school. In that period, the only objects that could momentarily kill Sehun’s pain were drugs. He would start mixing with the bad people, be disowned, and lead a ruined life. Tao could see this flash before his mind once he had helped Luhan wind back time, and so he decided not to linger any longer in this period of time, this alternate universe that was cast off and long forgotten. By leaving, Luhan had left behind pain.

He floated down to where Luhan had been moments earlier, watched the tiny teardrop splattered onto concrete – the last thing Luhan left behind – and it was then that he decided to let his own tears fall.

When Luhan opened his eyes, he was back into the cold. It was white and so much brighter than when Luhan had last seen it. He could tell by the way the people around him shivered and huddled closer to their clothes or to other people that it was cold, but he felt nothing. Only a tingling sensation could be felt throughout his whole body, but otherwise, numbness was the only thing he could feel.

This, Luhan thought with a start, feeling fear creep upon him. This feeling of nothingness … this nothingness of a feeling is scary. Much worse than pain, because not caring about anything is much, much worse. It felt inhumane.

“Come on, Luhan. Go buy coffee for me.”

“Me too.”

“Me too.”

It felt so long ago since he had heard those voices, the taunting tone, but he paid them no mind, because right now something else mattered more than being dumped into ice cold water. As he watched his friends look around in awe, felt the crush of the snow under his boots, Luhan slipped into the crowd when his friends were busy looking somewhere else.

He searched his pockets and felt something in there that certainly wasn’t there before, and then remembered what Sehun had said. Everything felt like a dream, a vision, as if all those five months that he had apparently went through were nothing but something he had thought of while he walked with his friends. Curious, he took it out and opened the small piece of paper that had been neatly folded into his pocket.

I love you. I’ll be back soon.

That was it. That was enough to bring the blinding pain back, wracking the whole of Luhan’s body until he realised that he had stopped breathing. Once again his feelings were back, his love, his guilt, his pain, now more real than anything he had ever felt before. He took a gulp of air, once again willing his tears away, and made sure to take more breaths in case he died of heartbreak.

Luhan clenched it tightly in his fist, his eyes blinded by the pain in his heart, and the only things he saw before him were memories of him and Sehun together. One by one they flashed before his mind, each one giving Luhan a loud throb in the heart; Sehun’s smile, Sehun’s fingers, Sehun’s touch, Sehun’s lips, Sehun’s everything. He stumbled and pushed past people in the crowd, so concentrated in the Sehun in his mind, that he didn’t see, didn’t notice as he passed a certain blond headed man with a bouquet of flowers in one hand, standing alone in front of the fountain on a cold December morning.

With just a twist of fate, their intersecting paths never cross. Instead they walk side by side on a parallel line, able to see each other if they stretched their necks and tiptoed high enough, but never able to meet.

The End.

That's the ending for this story. :D

But I didn't find it very satisfying, so I decided to write an alternate ending. I promise you the alternate is much, much better (in my opinion anyway). So please look forward to it! 

Thank you for supporting me throughout Finite Flowers, thank you all so much. ><